Joining the Team

by Wrestlr

[M/M, MC]

Synopsis: This summer Diego and Curt are tasked with preparing their younger brothers to join the college swim team.

Disclaimer: The naked hypnotist strides confidently into your room. His lips curl in what might be a smile as he dangles his shiny crystal pendulum before your eyes and announces, "Listen and obey. If you are not of legal age, or if you offended by sexual situations, you will leave this place immediately. From here on, no matter how realistic it may appear, everything will seem like fiction to you, a pleasant dream where scientific possibilities and laws may change according to my suggestion. Now, if you are willing, sit back, relax, and enjoy the ride."

Copyright - 2023 by Wrestlr. Permission granted to archive if and only if no fee (including any form of "Adult Verification") is charged to read the file. If anyone pays a cent to anyone to read your site, you can't use this without the express permission of (and payment to) the author. This paragraph must be included as part of any archive.

Comments to wrestlr@iname.com

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Joining the Team

by Wrestlr

1. Diego and Curt: Back in Town, Early Summer

Diego stowed his gear in the closet of the bedroom he had previously shared with his younger brother and would be sharing again for the next few months. He was home from college for summer break.

He stripped down to his team underwear. Shucking his clothes put him at ease--as if, in the last year, being dressed in anything other than his team swimsuit or his team underwear somehow went against the laws of nature for him. He surveyed himself in the mirror. Not bad, he decided. Black hair and dark brown eyes. Latin American genes. He stood six-foot-two and his body was almost hairless even without shaving for swimming. Twenty years old, good-looking, and definitely not built like a skinny kid anymore--the intense workouts that the swimming coach and Master Tom put the team through, supplemented by his own extra time in the gym with the weights, had enhanced his broad shoulders, the taper to his narrow waist, his muscular limbs, and a tight, rounded rump. His male equipment strained the front of his team briefs noticeably. Two years on the college swim team had shown him that, even soft, his cock and balls were bigger than average, not pornstar-huge maybe, but big enough to make him man-proud when he stripped down with the guys. And thanks to those artifacts Master Tom introduced to the team last fall, Diego knew that when he got hard after practice, his erection was one of the biggest on the team. He liked to strip down and get hard with his teammates. Being naked and stiff-dicked after practice had become a badge of honor for everyone on the team, but especially for Diego himself.

He groped his crotch n front of the mirror, feeling a flare of pleasure from the meat-tube napping in the pouch of his team underwear. The thin fabric was not quite the same blue of the school colors, but it was really close. After the artifacts, everyone on the team started wearing underwear like this, a show of solidarity of course but also the briefs framed their asses and cradled their cocks and balls in a way that just felt so damned sexy. From the front, the garment looked like a combination of the racing swimsuit the team members wore during their meets crossed with a slightly skimpy version of some designer brief, and in the rear the underwear turned into just a butt-baring band around the waist and each thigh like a jock-strap. If they bent forward, their buttholes would be easy to access. Yeah, definitely sexy to look at and wear. Wearing the team undergear represented a near-constant reminder of who they were, the team they belonged to, and Diego loved that feeling--all his teammates felt that way, too.

A noise made Diego stop and listen. Was someone coming upstairs? No, just a random noise, he decided. Being home for the summer would be great, but having to share the bedroom with his kid brother again meant little privacy for Diego to jack off, and probably no chance of inviting his buddy Curt over to swap blow-jobs or trade butt-fucks. Diego's kid brother Berto, like his parents, had no inkling of the changes Diego and his teammates had gone through in the past year, and Coach had given him--and all his teammates--strict orders to keep those changes a secret from outsiders. But Diego had a plan.

Diego was not ashamed of the changes. No, in the last year he had always followed the instructions from Coach and Master Tom, and keeping the secret was simply a matter of neglecting to announce the new training practices to his other friends and family. When the team came back to campus for that first week of the previous fall semester, Diego had been one of the first members Coach called into his office, the first group to see the artifacts, feel what the artifacts did, and start down the path to a whole new type of training. Within a few days, all of his teammates had been introduced to the artifacts, and they all soon became fuck-buddies after practice. Almost every day since, Diego had had at least two or three of his teammates pump their cream down his cum-hungry throat, or plow a stiff dick up his eager ass, or take his cock up their holes. Fuck, yeah!

Last fall had been the start of his sophomore year. The first day after practice, Diego and two of his teammates were called into Coach's office, and Coach introduced them to grad-student-aged man called "Master Tom"--which Diego had first though was a weird-assed thing to call someone, but afterward, once Master Tom had introduced Diego and the other two to the artifacts and shown them what the artifacts did, well, calling him "Master Tom" seemed as natural as breathing to Diego. And after he had been introduced to the artifacts, one of the hardest things Diego had ever had to do was keep everything a secret from his teammate and best friend Curt, until Curt's turn came a few days later to be called into Coach's office for his own introduction.

After that, Diego and Curt and their teammates had turned their promising season into an unforgettable year. They had gone from undersexed, frustrated athletes to a pack of perpetual horndogs for whom every day after practice and practically every time two or more of them were alone together became opportunities to suck each other off and fuck each other. They were bare-assed together more often than they were dressed. When the end of the school year rolled around, the swimmers were reluctant to separate and return to their respective homes for summer break.

Diego knew returning to the small hometown where he grew up would be boring. Diego and Curt had been best friends all through high school; they had been on the high school swim team together, had gone to college together, and were on the college team together. With their new training practices, Curt had also become Diego's favorite sex-buddy too. Diego felt the familiar tingling in his balls that meant he needed to get his rocks off right now. He forced himself to ignore it--if he'd given himself even one good stoke, he'd have cum for sure. Save it for the plan, he kept telling himself.

He had planned to wait in the bedroom he would be sharing with his brother and get started on his plan immediately, but maybe the plan would wait until later that night. Right then, he was too horny--and he wanted Curt's mouth around his cock. Diego reached for a pair of cut-off shorts that were almost threadbare at the crotch, squirmed into them, and tucked away his partially swollen cock; he pulled on an A-shirt that highlighted his shoulders and arms, and a pair of scuffed running shoes. Yeah, he decided as he examined himself in the mirror, his body bulged in all the right places. Seconds later he was running down the stairs and calling, "Going over to Curt's--be back later," to his mother as he rushed out into the sunny afternoon.

His town was nestled in the hills, as quiet as any rural hamlet. The pace of the life here was slow. As Diego jogged to Curt's house, he heard the sounds of children playing in the distance and passed elderly neighbors dozing on shady porches.

"Is Curt home?" Diego asked as soon as Curt's mother let him in. If the answer were a negative, Diego was afraid his jock-nuts were going to explode on the spot--he was too damned horny!

"He's upstairs unpacking. How'd your finals go?"

"Fine. I'm going up to say hey to him." Diego was already rushing up the stairs, afraid he'd go full-woody in front of his buddy's mother; no way would his shorts hide a hard-on! Knowing Curt upstairs, Diego could almost smell the heady fragrance of his teammate's crotch. The frayed front of Diego's cut-offs was already inflating as his cock hardened.

By the time Diego reached the doorway to the room Curt shared with his own younger brother Trace, he had the flaps of his shorts parted to reveal his flat belly and the top of his team briefs behind his spread zipper. Diego's pecker was nearly at full-mast, the bloated knob trapped beneath one of his shorts pockets and pushing the front of the fabric forward.

"Looks like you're sure happy to see me," Curt teased with a broad grin when his eyes locked on Diego's open fly. Curt, Anglo-blond, was built much the same as his buddy: broad shoulders, narrow waist, well-muscled limbs. When Diego had interrupted him, Curt was wearing nothing but his team underwear, and the moment Diego entered the room, Curt's own pecker began to swell the underwear pouch as it moved toward attention.

"I'm so fucking happy to see you I can't think straight--and I've brought something special for us, too," Diego grinned back, as he rapidly pushed the door shut, pulled something small out of his shorts pocket, and shoved his cut-offs and underwear to the floor. His sizable hard-on snapped away from his hip and jutted forward and upward in front of his abdomen.

"So I see," Curt smirked as Diego sauntered across the room in just his running shoes and A-shirt and wrapped his arms around Curt's waist, stabbing his boner against Curt's hip. "If that's what you brought for me, it's a great present--just the right size," Curt murmured happily as he ground his leg against Diego's erection.

"Your cock isn't exactly drooping," Diego purred back as he groped his buddy's rod through the thin fabric of those briefs. "But that's not what I was talking about." He held up his other hand and opened it, palm up.

Diego held something round and flattened, something that might have been mistaken for a large coin, had Curt not known better. "One of the artifacts? Coach and Master Tom loaned you one?" Curt exclaimed as the object began to open on his buddy's palm. The object unfolded iridescent, nearly transparent panels, becoming three-dimensional, catching the light, implying a rotating motion, familiar and slow, and Curt groaned as he felt the familiar lethargy, the sweet mind-enthralling pleasure and torpor, wash over him. But--

"We better not ... Not now," Curt slurred. By now, after nearly a year, he knew how to ride the effect, maybe couldn't resist but knew how to steer it a bit. He tried to cover the artifact in Diego's palm with his hand, force it to close and go dormant again. "Mom's home ... Trace ... Any second ..."

"Come on, cock-sucker," Diego murmured, his thickened voice showing he too was affected. He pulled his hand away from Curt's, and the artifact continued its unfurling, refracting the lights and Curt's thoughts. "You want ... bad as I do."

Another moment, and Curt was lost in the effect, swaying slightly, unable to resist.

"Get bare-assed ...," Diego ordered quietly. "Wanna fuck ... your face ... Need ... cum ... so bad ..."

Curt hooked his thumbs into the waistband of his briefs, shoved them an inch or two down, then froze. His fuck-pole was still half-caught in the fabric. A nagging worry about his parents or brother walking in. "What if ... Trace ..."

"Worry ... later," Diego grumbled. His fingers circled the knob-helmet of Curt's cock through the fabric of the team briefs. A drop of pre-cum leaked through the weave. "Strip ..."

By then Curt was too far lost in the effect to fight or to care who came in, so he complied with Diego's order.

# # #

Afterward, after having spent themselves in a mutually satisfying sixty-nine, back in their underwear and shorts, with the artifact safely tucked away in Diego's pocket again, the two lay together on the floor, relishing the afterglow of the effect and their orgasms.

"Shit, when you stop worrying, you can really eat a guy's meat!" Diego sighed. "You're the best cock-sucker on the team."

"That was real risky," Curt murmured, finger-tracing a pattern on his buddy's chest. "What if my mom or Trace had barged in?"

"If Trace walked in on us eating each other's meat, he'd have gotten a free education," Diego groaned, too relaxed now to worry. "Maybe he'd like to join in. The little fucker's legal now, right?--Just like my brother. Maybe the two of them've already learned about cock-sucking. If they haven't, they're overdue to learn, like we did. Damn, we wasted so much time back before the artifacts when we could have been gettin' our rocks off together." He paused for a contented post-sex yawn. "We should show 'em the artifacts tonight and teach 'em about what studs can do together, if they don't already know."

"Nuh-uh!" Curt said as he sat up, unable to believe Diego was serious. "Nuh-un! You know the rule about not letting anyone outside the team find out about the artifacts. Why'd Coach and Master Tom even let you bring that one home for the summer anyway?"

Diego yawned again and stretched. "Just told you--to introduce Berto and Trace to it. They're coming to college with us in the fall, and they'll be joining the swim team. I talked Coach about letting you 'n' me train Berto 'n' Trace with one of the artifacts over the summer, so's they'll have a couple months head-start when they officially join the team."

"Uh, I dunno," Curt replied as he watched Diego squirm back into his tank-top. "I've never thought of doing anything with Trace."

"I never thought about getting into Berto's pants before either," Diego said, "but once I thought of getting him a head-start before fall, it seemed like a great idea. Don't you want Trace to get a head-start too?"

"What if they don't like the idea?" Diego worried. "Just because the artifact turned you and me into cock-suckers doesn't mean they'll go for it. I don't think Coach or Master Tom would appreciate them telling our parents about the artifacts either."

"You, me, and the whole team--if those things could turn the whole swim team into cock-suckers, I doubt a couple of horny soon-to-be-freshmen like Berto or Trace will be much of a problem. We just gotta be real cool about it at first, ease them into it, like Coach and Master Tom did with us. That'll work, right?"

"But ..."

Diego reached for his shoes. "Listen, Berto is eighteen and out of high-school. Trace too. It's gonna happen to them both regardless, once they join the team, so we might as well be the ones to introduce them to it. I'll bet we can teach them to suck cock and fuck real good by the end of the summer. Think of all of the extra action we'll be getting with the two of them."

Curt thought about it. Diego's plan probably would work, but that didn't mean the plan was a good idea.

Diego grinned. "I'm going to start on Berto tonight. Think about it and I bet you'll see how it'll be good for Trace too. Since we're both sharing bedrooms with our brothers, privacy to work on 'em without our parents finding out shouldn't be a problem."

"I can't believe Coach let you borrow one. How'd you ever convince him that was a good idea?"

"Thought it was a great idea, actually--Coach and Master Tom both. And I didn't hear you complaining a few minutes ago either, when we had our dicks in each other's throats."

Curt really enjoyed cock-sucking and guy-on-guy sex now, something he wouldn't have even imagined he'd be into at all a year ago, but he still wasn't sure introducing their younger brothers to the artifacts and male/male sex was a good idea. And anyway--

Just then, Trace bounded into the room and zoomed directly for Curt, hugging his older brother hard, hollering, "You're finally home! I sure missed you, Curt!"

"How ya been, squirt?" Curt laughed, using an old nickname, as he rumpled his kid brother's hair.

"Better now you're home." Then: "Hi, Diego," Trace said when he stepped back and became aware that he and Curt weren't alone. "What are you guys doing up here?" Trace felt a little embarrassed that his emotional outburst had been witnessed by someone else. He had the vague sense that he had interrupted something intense between the two of them.

"Oh, just fucking around," Diego chuckled with a wink in Curt's direction. "Listen, I gotta get back home. You remember what we agreed on," he added, heading toward the bedroom door.

"Are you sure?" Curt fretted, just before Diego stepped into the hall. Had they really agreed on what Diego planned?--Curt thought they had only been discussing it. He knew that Berto would be just as glad to see Diego, but somehow seducing the pair of trusting younger brothers seemed weird. They were eighteen year old and legal, sure, but they were both still in that hero-worshipping stage; taking advantage of them with the artifact seemed somehow unfair.

"I'm gonna start tonight," Diego confirmed.

"Start what tonight?" Trace wanted to know as his eyes bounced from one older youth's face to the other.

"Don't worry, squirt," Diego said as he exited. "You'll find out soon."

2. Diego and Berto: Introducing Berto

His plans for Berto that night had Diego antsy as hell throughout dinner. The more Diego thought about the upcoming seduction, the more aroused he became. Coach was going to be so pleased, come fall, when Diego delivered Berto pre-trained and ready to go. The fact that his conquest was his younger brother made Diego even more randy for some reason, which was odd because he had never-ever thought about taking charge of his brother sexually like this before. But once he had thought about it, the plan made perfect sense. Diego's over-eager peter kept creeping up toward his waistband inside the confines of his shorts, then softening a little, only to get hard again a few moments later, as if his cock was a feral animal testing the bars of its cage.

How would the introduction play out? Diego's mind kept running through scenarios all during dinner. Maybe:

Or:

Or:

Diego was even more impatient through the hours he spent watching mindless television and talking with his parents afterward about classes, exams, college in general. Sometimes his thoughts wandered too much into the last time he had seen his brother naked. Diego passed off his distraction by saying he was just worried about how he had done on one of his finals, though he was sure he had scored well. By ten o'clock, when Berto said goodnight to the parents and went padding up the stairs, Diego forced himself to wait five more minutes. He excused himself, said he was tired from his trip home and was going to bed, and he rushed to the second floor.

Diego found their shared bedroom empty and the door to the bathroom closed. He heard his brother stirring around inside and he felt a flush of nervous excitement. Diego knew Berto often showered in the evenings, to save time in the morning before he went to the pool to swim. Since Diego also knew he wouldn't be able to delay his plans another moment, he reached for the door handle and gave it a twist. Now was as good a time as any to get his plan underway. Yeah, Coach was gonna be so damn proud of him!

Berto, caught by surprise, stood on the bathmat in just a pair of basic snow-white briefs. His brother's hair was the same black as Diego's, his skin the same Latino gold, and his six-foot frame was nicely developed but less filled out. Berto had a lanky physique, and his cute little butt was barely two handfuls of tight flesh. Compared to how worldly Diego thought he himself had become, everything about his brother, technically an adult, seemed small-town innocence personified--except for the sleeping all-male mound in the front of Berto's underwear that Diego looked forward to unwrapping soon.

Diego slipped in and closed the door behind him. Though they had often seen each other in their underwear and even naked, Berto still looked self-conscious stripped to his briefs, a look that brought out a predatory eagerness in Diego. Certainly Berto couldn't have missed the way Diego had been eyeing him all evening, couldn't have missed the occasional mysterious smirks as Diego thought about his plans and how they might unfold. The events at college had really changed Diego, made him more confident, more sexual, compared to last year, and he wondered whether Berto sensed that difference now. Maybe--but Diego knew his kid brother wouldn't have a clue about what brought about the changes, not yet, but soon. Diego gave his brother a wink and a smile as he flicked the bathroom door lock.

Berto dropped one hand modestly to his crotch, as if hoping to conceal the noticeable bulge in his underwear. He asked, "Do you need to use the toilet before I shower?"

"Naw, kid, I thought I'd shower with you," Diego said, kicking off his trainers and tugging his shirt over his head. "If I wait until you get through, the hot water will be gone. You don't mind sharing your shower with me, do you?" He pushed his shorts down with one fast shove and took a step forward, leaving his pants on the floor behind him.

Though Diego thought that quick flicker across his brother's expression meant he did indeed mind, Berto shook his head. Diego noted how Berto's dark eyes zeroed in on his team briefs and the flash of ass that had showed when he had stepped free of his shorts.

"What's with the weird underpants?" Berto asked. "Your butt's hanging out the back."

Diego turned to display his ass in profile. This also probably showed off his bulge in front, how far it pushed out from Diego's body, but Berto's eyes stayed on the butt cheeks. "Like 'em? We call them our team underwear. All the guys on the team wear them. We'll get you a pair too, once you officially join this fall. Cool, huh?"

"I guess ... if you like having your butt showing," Berto laughed, as though he thought the team underwear was more silly than sexy, but he still gawked when Diego stripped off that last garment.

Suddenly Diego's big flaccid cock and low-hanging nuts hung out in the open. He fingered his free-swinging genitals, watched Berto's face. The erection Diego had been trying to will down all evening couldn't be put off any longer. His meaty prick began pulsing to life. Diego moved his hips to make his swelling dick and ball sack sway a little, enjoying his brother's stunned expression.

"Uh, you've got a hard-on!" Berto bleated. Seeing Diego's hard-on steadily expand made Berto's jaw drop and eyes widen. He blinked nervously but didn't look away.

Diego noted a similar rise beginning in Berto's white briefs and smirked. "Like what you see?"

Berto made a throaty sound and quickly got busy with reaching behind the shower curtain and turning on the taps. "I--uh--I don't think there's room in the shower for both of us. Maybe you should--"

"What are you talking about?" Diego quipped as he stationed himself next to the slightly shorter youth. "Compared to the stalls at college, there's enough room in there for three or four bare-assed guys."

Diego would've liked to have been naked with Berto without throwing a rod first thing, but the prospect of what he was about to do with his brother had really charged up his libido. By now his cock was standing at full salute. But Diego didn't want to frighten his brother away before he had a chance to get his plan fully underway.

When Berto turned back, his gaze veered again to Diego's crotch. His eyes widened again at the sight of the man-erect rod but he didn't turn away. "You're gonna shower with a hard-on?" the kid stammered as he blushed intensely. Diego noted that Berto seemed more fascinated than alarmed.

"Sure. This always happens when I get naked," Diego snickered. A small fib--but after all these months of post-practice training with the artifacts and sex with his fellow swimmers, and the eager anticipation of what he was about to do, his body definitely thought getting naked warranted an unfightable boner. "The whole team's used to it by now. Come on. Get bare-assed with me. You can't take a shower in your underwear, kid."

Berto was shielding his underwear-clad crotch with his hand again, shifting his weight as if he didn't know what to do. He finally decided to own up to his own predicament. He gulped and muttered, "Don't look. I--I've got a hard-on too." His voice was quiet, apologetic, as if he were afraid of being ridiculed for throwing a rod in the same room with his brother.

"That's cool," Diego beamed. "It's only embarrassing if one of us gets a boner, but if both of us are sporting wood, we can't make fun of each other for it, right? Nothing wrong with a couple of guys getting boners at the same time. Get those briefs off and show me what you're packing, kid. Let's see whose is bigger."

"Huh? No, no--I don't--"

"Just do it. And get used to it. You don't want the team to think you're a whiny little wuss when you throw a hard-on in the locker room, do you?"

Diego always knew just how to goad Berto into action and the little poke at his masculinity worked. His pride at stake, Berto now had choice; he hooked his thumbs into the waistband of his briefs and slid them off. He had twisted the lower half of his body toward the shower curtain, hoping to prevent Diego from getting a good look at his boner--but that only put the younger brother's erection in profile, giving Diego an even better view of the length of Berto's throbbing erection and the curve of his bare behind.

"Fuck, you're hung as big as I am, Berto!" Diego remarked, knowing a thick slathering of praise after the jab would make Berto more agreeable--compliments always did--but Diego also felt an odd fraternal pride as he ogled his brother's stiff dick, and maybe a little jealousy that Berto's cock was already as long and as thick as his. Both brothers had their pubes trimmed to stubble for swimming, which emphasized the size of their rods. In length, Berto's dick was about the same as his, but Berto's shaft was smoother, the veins less pronounced, the angle a little downward. "Don't hide your prick from me," Diego continued. "You got a real nice one, a real man-sized piece of meat; nothing to be ashamed of. C'mon--I'm showing you mine. Show me yours."

Still Berto hesitated. "I dunno if we should be ..."

"Your dick's definitely a big one," Diego flattered. "I'll bet you milk that sucker all the time, right? How often do you jack a load out of your beautiful dick?"

Berto blushed and frowned. Diego wondered if maybe no one had told him how pretty his cock was before. Berto stammered, "I dunno--I jack off two or three times a day, I guess. I get so horny I can't help it. I used to think I was the only guy who beat my meat, until Trace told me he does the same thing. Said he gets so turned-on he has to stroke off wherever he is or he'll go crazy. He's jacked off in the restroom at school, out in his backyard behind his garage, and in the bushes at that park on the way home. Once he even pumped out a load in the back seat of the car while his parents were driving him someplace. He said that was real messy, but a lot of fun because of the risk. He keeps saying we should try beating each other off sometime, but ... uh ..."

"Have you?"

Berto shook his head no, eyes aimed down at the floor in embarrassment.

"Why not?" Diego wanted to know. "Aren't you curious about what Trace has between his legs?"

Berto shrugged. "I dunno ... It sounds queer or something, I guess."

"Fuck that! Jacking off with a buddy feels great!"

Berto raised an eyebrow and looked at Diego. "You've done that? With a guy?"

"Sure!" Diego nodded, feeling the steam billowing out from behind the shower curtain as the forgotten spray continued to blast the empty stall. "Want me to show you? We can jack each other."

Diego reached for Berto's pecker, but before he could wrap his fingers around it, his brother shied backward and aside. "Don't!" Berto hissed.

"What's the big deal? The guys on the team jack off together all the time. You don't want them to think you're some repressed asshole this fall, do you?"

Berto's eyebrow went up again. "You've jacked off with your teammates? Even Curt?"

"Sure have. All the time. Like I said, it feels great."

Berto frowned again, as he processed this new information.

Diego grinned, wondering what Berto would think if he knew Diego had done a lot more than jerk off with Curt and the team. Diego reached again, and this time Berto didn't shift away, allowed Diego's hand to capture his shaft and grip firmly. Berto looked as though every muscle in his body had tensed, but he wasn't pulling back. Diego gave that cock a slow stroke, and Berto responded by tentatively humping his pelvis forward, sliding his hard-on through the coil of Diego's fist.

"Feel good, kid?" Diego asked, sotto voce.

A slight nod. "I guess. But isn't this kind of ..." Berto shivered and abruptly pulled away, his cock escaping before Diego could tighten his grasp. "Stop. This is too weird," Berto declared, ashamed, blushing, half-turning, and hiding his erection behind his hands.

Diego tried not to scowl. He didn't like being refused, but he'd already gotten his hero-worshipping brother to go further than he'd expected, a lot further. Yeah, maybe Berto was going to be easier than he thought. Diego reached for his discarded shorts, into a pocket. All he needed to do was bring out his ace, like he'd planned all along.

"Hey, bro, I got something to show you. Look at this." Diego held up his hand between them, opened his fingers to reveal the coin-like artifact lying on his upturned palm. Diego never knew quite what activated one of the artifacts, what caused it to open, how long the effect would last--maybe until its charge ran out?--but that introduced the question of how it recharged, and on what. Even Master Tom, who'd found them and knew more about them than anyone, hadn't figured out those answers. All Diego knew was they tended to work when in the presence of a horny guy, and both he and his brother were obviously horned-up.

And sure enough, the artifact began to open, unfolding an intricate series of translucent membranes, almost transparent, refracting light into a soft glow, the pattern of them becoming more complex, a puzzle that pulled in the gaze. Some artifacts glowed with a hint of blue or green; this one wove patterns of gold and pale pink.

"What's thaaa ...," Berto began, voice trailing away, and Diego smirked, knowing the euphoric effect was already hitting his brother hard.

The artifacts spread a relaxed daze into anyone nearby; under their influence, a guy's thoughts dulled and an intense horniness filled his body, and the effect was pretty much irresistible. Diego, after months, had learned to ride the effect, like a surfer rides an ocean wave, but he knew from his own early days that the effect was slamming Berto's mind like a tsunami. From now until the effect wore off, Berto's mind was pretty shut down. He'd do whatever he was told, wouldn't remember a thing. Remembering had taken Diego and his teammates months to master, and even then their memories weren't always--

Focus on the present, Diego scolded himself. He needed to stay focused, not get lost in the effect too, needed to prevent himself from succumbing to the artifact, at least until he had done what he needed to do, what Coach instructed him to do.

"Whu'zz ...," Berto slurred again. His expression had softened, the muscles of his face gone slack, his arms going limp so that his obscuring hands eased away from his cock, throbbing back to full hardness.

Diego liked that look, liked it a lot--slack face, hard dick--it meant the artifact was working and Berto was becoming more receptive by the second to the training Diego had been tasked to perform. "Yeah, you like that ... don't you," Diego told his naked brother, pushing through the effect to make his own thickened voice work. "Can see ... you do." Diego liked the effect the artifact was having on him too, his own stiff rod matching Berto's, but he had a job to do, needed to focus, ride the effect instead, not let it roll over him.

"Just ... stare into it, bro ... Shiny ... Eyes on it ... Look deep in ... into it ...Take ... deep breath ... Yeah, like that ... Breathe deep, kid ... Listen ... my voice ..."

"Hrr," Berto moaned quietly, the sound of a guy who found himself overwhelmed with pleasure.

"Shh ... Stay with me ... kid ... Just listen ... Just relax ... Enjoy ... Feels good, right?"

"Urr."

"Eye ... lids ... so heavy ... heavy ... Deeper in it ... Let it ... fill you ... Relax you ... Eyes heavy ... Feel so good, right?"

Diego slipped his free hand around Berto's pulsing cock again, the lightest of grips, and slid his circled palm and fingers along the shaft.

"Nnn ..." Something in Berto's face twitched.

"Don't fight ... Can't fight ... Don't wanna fight ... Wanna r'lax ... Wanna feel good ... Enjoy ... Right?"

Berto's face loosened again. "Mm ... mm." His body leaned just slightly into Diego's grip, wanting more stimulation on his rod.

"R'laxed ... Eyes heavy ... Drowsy ... Sleepy ... Heavier ... Eyes closing ... So r'laxed ... Feel so good ... Close eyes ... Close ..."

Berto's eyelids had been drooping, and now they slid the rest of the way shut. Diego knew from experience Berto didn't need to be looking at the artifact to be affected by it, and now his brother had slipped beyond being able to resist. Caught on the hook, and now Diego just needed to reel him in.

"Eyes ... closed ... Feel so good ... R'laxed ... Enjoy ... So nat'ral ... Give in ... Belong ... Part of the team ... We're ... a team of two ... Follow my orders ... like your coach ... Follow orders ... Obey ... Obey y'r coach ..."

"Coowsh ...," Berto slurred.

"Tha's right ... I'm y'r coach ... Obey my orders ..."

Berto stood and swayed slightly. Whatever inhibitions he had maintained moments earlier were gone now under the artifact's influence. With a little training, Diego knew those inhibitions would stay gone forever, just like had happened to him and his swim teammates. He felt proud that Coach and Master Tom had chosen him to help Berto get a head-start on team training.

Diego quickly gathered up his clothes and shoes, Berto's too, into a wadded bundle. "Hold these," he instructed Berto, pressing the bundle to his brother's chest and waiting until Berto's slow-motion arms, unsteady as a newborn colt, rose to fold around the wad. Diego unlocked the bathroom door, opened it quietly, stuck his head into the hallway to listen closely for their parents. Nothing but the faint sound of the television from downstairs. Great!

Diego wrapped his hand around Berto's erection. "Follow me ...," he said and, using his grip on Berto's iron cock like a leash, led his brother into the hallway--Berto zombie-shuffling slowly, without opening his eyes--and into their bedroom. Diego shut the door behind them, and locked it.

The artifact's pink-gold glow was faint illumination in the dark room, enough to see by. "Drop it," Diego said, and Berto's arms loosened and the mushed-together clothing tumbled to the floor. A shoe whumpa'ed softly when it hit, and Diego froze for a moment, listened. Okay, the sound was too quiet to have gotten their parents' attention.

Diego led his brother over to his bed. "Lie down ..." Diego guided him, and closed-eyed Berto half-stumbled and half-rolled onto the mattress until he was prone, on his back with his cock easily accessible.

Diego gently placed the artifact, still shining, its membranes rotating slowly, on Berto's nightstand. He sat on the edge of the bed. The effect made everything feel distant and dreamy, and Diego knew he didn't have much time left before he himself couldn't fight it back any longer. His hand moving toward Berto's cock already seemed to belong to someone else. He watched himself stroke his brother's meat. Berto moaned softly, as if enjoying a sexy dream.

"Trace talked to you ... 'bout jerkin' off?" Diego asked. "Now I'm ... y'r coach ... jerkin' ya off too ..." He watched his fist glide slowly up and down Berto's shaft and reached for his own with his other hand. He wanted to make his brother's balls dance in unison with his own, wanted to make their hard-ons spurt together. "It's ... not queer ... Know that ... now ... Right? No worries ... No fears ... Feels good ... Right?"

"Rzz ..."

"Good boy ... Gonna make us so ... much closer, Berto ... Part of th' team ... Doin' what y'r coach says ... You can do it to me ... Stroke my cock ... You know ... want to ... It's okay ... Part of th' team ..."

Berto's closer hand lifted blindly. Diego took Berto's wrist, guided his brother's fingers to his rod, and felt those fingers circle and squeeze and start stroking up and down. At first Berto was trance-clumsy, but eventually he was giving Diego the same smooth hand-action he was getting himself. Diego felt a flush of pride that Berto was taking so well to the effect. His brother would soon be just as well-trained as Diego himself was. Come fall, when they arrived on campus, Coach and Master Tom would be so pleased, so impressed!

"Real fine ... Berto ... Lemme show ... something else ... can do t'gether."

The older swimmer bent over the naked youth and guided his lips to his brother's rigid rod. Diego opened his jaw and soon had the kid's dick lodged halfway down his greedy throat. Eyes still closed, Berto moaned quietly, and Diego knew the youth was feeling too damn good thanks to the artifact's effect and the mouth riding up and down his pole.

After a few moments, Berto's nuts rode up and Diego knew his brother was about to shoot. Kid must have a hair trigger, Diego noted as he separated his mouth from the Berto's cock, to let him cool down. "I'm ... sucking ... y'r cock, buddy ...," Diego muttered, fighting to keep riding the effect, stay in control, not let it overwhelm him. "I do ... more'n that for ... team ..." Speaking was getting too hard; Diego was nearly gone himself. "Soon ... you will too ..." He sprawled himself out on the bed, pressed himself next to Berto so they were laying head to crotch. Diego's cock-head touched Berto's lips. "Lick ..."

Berto's throat released a soft "Rrrr." A protest perhaps? Or, no, an agreement. Berto's tongue emerged from his lips and lapped perpendicular at Diego's meat--clumsily, though whether from the effect or from inexperience Diego couldn't tell, and by that point didn't care.

"Open ... Open y'r mouth ...," Diego instructed. "Put it in y'r mouth ... My cock ... Want ... in y'r sweet mouth ..."

"Ahnnn ...," Berto moaned, only slightly louder than breathing. His face was all but squashed into Diego's groin, and Diego's cock-head was bumping against Berto's pliant lips and nose. Even though the kid sounded like he was resisting, he was too far gone in the effect to refuse.

"Do it ... for team ... Right? Just open ... mouth ... Let ... dick slide in ... Do it for ... y'r coach ..."

Berto's face twitched and then his slack jaw shifted enough to let Diego's dick-head glide between his lips. Diego moved his hips slowly, gently, giving whatever auto-pilot was left of Berto's mind time to figure out how to accept the intruder. Berto's jaw shifted again, wider, and soon Diego was able to poke more of his dick into his brother's inexperienced mouth.

"Gonna be ... good cock-suck'r," Diego praised. "Good ... as me ..." He returned his mouth to Berto's nuts for a few licks. "Get ya trained up ... Follow along ... Do to me ... what I do ... you ..." He focused again on Berto's dick. The effect was too strong, irresistible, everything becoming oneness. He liked this feeling of connection, horniness, building pleasure and anticipation and a hundred other needs. Diego knew he couldn't last much longer and he needed to do this first. Every time Diego moved his head or lips or tongue, Berto mimicked him--clumsily, but his brother would learn soon enough, learn to handle the effect, learn to suck cock, learn to love getting off with his teammates every chance he got. Just like Diego had. The artifacts made it inevitable.

They were sealed mouth-to-cock on each other when Diego's thoughts faded into the ecstasy brought on by the artifact. Nothing existed now except cocks in mouths and the need for release. One set of balls tightened. One cock convulsed and began to spit its spunk, and the other cock did the same. Mouths tried to swallow, but cum seeped out of the corners of lips. Their bodies burned with bliss.

Some time later, when the artifact was spent and slowly furled into a coin form again, the effect faded. Diego pulled his face from Berto's spent cock. His brother, like all the newly introduced, as had happened to Diego after his early experiences, was still unconscious, would be for a while--would probably shift from unconsciousness to sleep and not wake up until morning. Right now, though, his mind was at peak receptiveness. Diego's was too, but he had a job to do. Time for him to whisper in Berto's ear, recite the indoctrination instructions Master Tom had made him memorize. He would do this each time until Berto was ready. The artifact opened the door, and this training was the path through it.

When he was through reciting the instructions, Diego grinned at his sleeping brother's slack face. "Yeah, you're gonna enjoy learnin'. Suckin' cock. Fuckin' ass. Gettin' fucked. Bein' part of the team." Diego bent in and kissed Berto's lips. "Bet you'll be even more eager for it next time, won't ya?"

3. Berto and Curt: Interlude

Berto woke up and blinked at the sunlight. He stretched and yawned. He felt both rested and tired. That was something new since Diego's return from college four days ago. Since Diego arrived, Berto had woken up feeling mentally as if he had slept well, but he was also somehow physically exhausted, his muscles feeling stretched and sore, as if during the night his body had been forced into unfamiliar poses. This morning his jaw ached, just like it had the past couple of days, though the soreness was less, as if his body was getting used to whatever the cause. And now his asshole burned a little, which was also new.

Berto pushed back the sheet, sat up, yawned again, stretched again. Naked again? Ever since Diego came home from college, Berto found he had started sleeping naked, instead of in his briefs like usual. He didn't remember going to bed naked--but then he didn't remember going to bed at all. The last thing he remembered last night was being in the bathroom, doing his nighttime rituals. He was at the sink, shoes off but shirt and shorts still on, brushing his teeth, while Diego stood in nothing but those weird open-assed team briefs at the toilet, pissing. Berto had seen Diego in his underwear or even naked lots of times growing up, but he'd never really looked closely at Diego's body, not the way he was looking now, appraising it in the mirror.

Leaning forward, spitting out the last of the toothpaste, last night Berto had surprised himself by being brave enough to tilt his head to get a better look openly at the profile of Diego's cock. Diego'd caught him peeking, of course, but didn't get angry. Instead, as he shook off the last few drops of piss and reached for the flush-lever, Diego smiled knowingly and turned his hips and torso toward Berto, as if displaying his soft meat to him. As Berto looked, Diego's cock started to thicken, lengthen. "Like what you see, kid?" Diego had said, using his old nickname for Berto. "It's not fair, me being the only one showing off his cock, is it? I want to see yours too. Strip, kid." And Berto surprised himself again by quickly wrestling off his T-shirt and shucking out of his shorts and underwear and standing stark naked in front of his brother, like he needed Diego's appraisal and praise. And Berto's cock had started to get hard too. The act felt mischievous, like calling his brother's bluff during a dare, and not at all shameful. Unlike just a few days ago, when Berto would've been mortified if Diego saw him with a hard-on, this time Berto felt proud to have pleased his older brother, and he basked in Diego's approving smile.

Diego had him make a bicep, and he felt Berto's muscle. Diego rubbed his hand over Berto's shoulder, then across his chest, seemed pleased with the catalog of Berto's swim-toned muscles. And then Diego lifted his other hand, and there was some glow of pink and gold, and the next thing Berto knew, he was waking up in bed.

He grabbed his phone from the bedside table, checked the time. Nearly ten o'clock. Ugh. He had really slept late, missed his morning jog and his morning swim. By now, Diego and Dad were long gone on their drive to do some errands. Berto would have liked to tag along; he didn't like the long trips for running errands, but he wanted to be near Diego as much as possible. Oh, well, a skip day on the gym work wouldn't hurt--and Diego and his dad would be home tonight.

Berto flexed his shoulders and stood up. Time to get on with the day.

Yesterday's clothes dumped on the floor? This was another new post-Diego's-return development. Berto wasn't a neat-freak, not at all, but he didn't usually leave discarded clothing all over the floor. He bent and picked a pair of shorts--these were the shorts Diego had worn yesterday. If he couldn't be with Diego physically, maybe wearing his shorts would be good enough, like a reminder of his brother or something, the new devotion Berto felt toward him.

Diego's underwear from yesterday, the fancy team briefs, was gone. Berto pulled a fresh pair of his own basic white briefs out of the drawer. He didn't have any fancy blue backless ones like Diego's team underwear. But maybe ...

Berto got the scissors from the nightstand drawer. He carefully snipped at the briefs, cutting along the seams, cutting away the back panel, leaving intact the elastic waistband and the seams at the leg openings that went around the thighs. Soon he had something that looked like briefs from the front, and a jock-strap from the back. A clumsy imitation of Diego's team underwear, but close enough. He hoped Diego would be impressed by the effort.

He stepped into the underwear. Wearing the modified pair felt strange, but maybe Berto just wasn't used to his butt hanging out like that. He stepped into Diego's shorts. Better. The difference felt less noticeable.

Berto rubbed his cock through the shorts. He felt something small and hard in one of the pockets alongside his stretching shaft. What had Diego left there? From the pocket he pulled a small disk, some dull metal, looked old, a little larger than a coin, a size that sat comfortably in Berto's palm, and seemed to have once had a pattern etched on it, nearly worn away. The disk wasn't a coin, had no obvious reason or purpose. Some sort of keepsake or good-luck token, perhaps? Whatever, Berto decided, and slid the object back into the shorts pocket. He had more pressing needs to take care of, specifically his full morning bladder.

He shuffled across the hall to the bathroom and pissed. Ahh! Nothing like that first piss in the morning, his body relaxed, cock still maybe a little morning-wooded and sensitive. Did all guys feel this good when they took their first piss in the morning?

Finished and flushed, Berto paused to appraise his shirtless look in the bathroom mirror. Yeah, swimming had given him a great body, and Diego seemed impressed by all his efforts. Berto knew he looked good, but somehow in the last few days getting Diego's approval had become significantly more important to him, almost the way in high school he had needed--craved--his hero-coach's validation. Well, he wasn't in high school anymore, Berto chided himself. In just a couple of months he would be going to college, on the swim team with Diego, hanging out with him whenever he wanted. Yeah, maybe hanging out shirtless together--comparing chests and biceps--even jacking off together like Trace had suggested, or licking--

Wait. Why was he thinking of jacking or sucking off his brother? A few days ago, that first night home, Diego had said something about jacking off with the swim team, with his friend Curt ... Somehow just the thought seemed both scandalous and sexy. How would the team do it?--In the showers, naked bodies crowded together and jostling each other under the spray?--Or in the locker area?--Or even in the pool itself, where the water surrounded their hard-ons and added to the sensations? Just the thought of his naked future teammates, maybe even Diego himself, nudging bare-assed into him as they stroked off together seemed not just sexy but sexual--not just an abstract action he might have thought about one or twice but something he now wanted very much to do--and Berto felt his cock begin to chub in his shorts--Diego's shorts--

Ding-ding!

The doorbell? Who the fuck--!

Berto stuck his head out into the hallway and listened. Diego and Dad were away for the day. He didn't hear his mother walking to the door--maybe she was out too, doing her own weekend errands? Berto sighed and willed his cock to go down and headed downstairs to answer the door.

"Hey, Berto!" Curt said when Berto opened the door. Curt was Trace's older brother, Diego's best friend, and Berto's soon-to-be swim teammate once college started. Curt gave Berto's shorts-clad body a quick up-and-down appraisal. "Looking good! How's summer treating you?"

"So far so good," Berto answered, trying to ignore the way Curt's glance made him feel, like he was too vulnerable, too much on display--an odd reaction, Berto thought, since he was used to parading around in front of teammates and spectators while wearing an even more revealing swimsuit. But his teammates and spectators had never looked at him like he was a piece of meat--

"Diego around?"

"No, he and Dad left a couple hours ago. Won't be back 'til tonight, I think."

"Oh? Damn, I guess I missed him," Curt replied, not sounding surprised at all. "Listen, I came over to borrow something from him. I bet it's up in his bedroom. You mind if I go look?"

Berto knew Diego and Curt were close friends and loaned each other stuff all the time. Surely whatever Curt wanted to borrow would be all right? "I guess that's okay," Berto began.

"Great!" Curt was already sliding past him and heading for the stairs.

By the time Berto got the front door closed and hurried up to his bedroom too, Curt had the ventilation grate in the floor open and was feeling around inside, around the curve of the ductwork. That was the supposedly top-secret hiding spot where, before college, Diego used to keep the thumb drive loaded with big-titted porn that he didn't want his parents, or Berto, to find out about. Made sense that Curt would know where Diego kept his hidden stashes, and Berto again remembered what Diego had said about the two of them jerking off together. "What are you looking for?" Berto asked as he reached for a T-shirt, hoping to feel less exposed around Curt--Curt was Diego's friend and Trace's brother, but Berto didn't know him too well.

"You don't have to get dressed on my account," Curt said. Giving up on the air duct, he extracted his arm, replaced the floor grate. He then went to a drawer that was another of Diego's old hiding spots.

Which meant, whatever Curt was after, it must have been something super-secret, something Diego didn't want anyone to know about. Berto couldn't decide whether to be intrigued about possibly learning another of Diego's secrets or annoyed because Curt was going through Diego's shit. Berto reached for his phone on the nightstand. "I'll call Diego and ask where whatever you're looking for is."

"No, don't interrupt him. I know he was looking forward to spending some time with your dad," Curt said, casually moving between Berto and the nightstand, blocking in a way that kind of annoyed Berto. "But maybe you've seen it? It's, uh, small, metal, about this big around." Curt held his index finger and thumb in a circle roughly the same size as--

"Oh! You mean this?" Berto stuck his hand in the shorts pocket, retrieved the disk, held it up. "This it?"

Curt grinned. "That's it!" And before Berto could react, Curt quickly plucked it from his fingers, which really-really annoyed the youth.

"What is it?"

"Hasn't Diego told you about this?" Curt placed it flat on his palm. "It's really old and kind of special ..."

# # #

Berto woke and stretched. He was lying on his bed, bare-chested, wearing just his shorts--Diego's shorts. Hadn't he put on a shirt earlier?--No matter. He must have been tired, must have laid down for a nap--yeah, that was it--though he didn't remember the particulars. Didn't remember Curt leaving either, but he wasn't here anymore. Berto sat up. His jaw really ached now, but it was somehow a good ache, satisfying, and echoed by a heavy, spent feeling in his cock and balls. His ever-present horniness definitely felt blunted, at least for now.

Berto yawned and reached for his phone. Just past noon. Damn. Definitely time to get up and get moving. He'd slept a good chunk of the day away.

4. Curt and Trace: Training Trace

While Diego was eager to get into Berto's pants, Curt was reluctant to seduce Trace. He'd put it off for days. Curt had kind of known, in the back of his mind, that what happened to him and the rest of the team would probably happen to Trace too, once he got to college and joined the team, but Curt hadn't much thought about how it would happen. He assumed Coach or Master Tom would be the ones to introduce Trace, Berto, and the other new members to the artifacts and the special training. Curt had never anticipated being the one to have to indoctrinate a newcomer, much less his own brother.

Curt regretted making the seduction pact with Diego. Maybe they should have agreed to do each other's brother? For Curt and Diego and the team to be cock-suckers and butt-fuckers was fine, but Curt just couldn't imagine being the one to train his own kid brother to enjoy getting down between some stud's legs to suck a stiff dick or eat out an ass.

At eighteen, Trace looked exactly like a younger version of Curt. Same blond hair cut swimmer-short, same height, same general frame but slimmer, less of the muscle mass Curt had worked up in the gym this past year. Though he had graduated from high school a few weeks ago, Trace still had the aw shucks appearance of an innocent boy at the onset of manhood.

As he rinsed his hands post-piss, Curt studied his face and bare chest in the bathroom mirror. He looked good, he knew; he needed to look good, stay in peak shape, for the team, for Coach and Master Tom. He hadn't seen his buddy Diego since the afternoon they'd made the pact. Which meant Diego--that horny fucker!--had likely gone through with seducing Berto with the artifact and had spent the last several days getting his rocks off with his brother instead of coming over to suck and fuck with Curt. Dammit, Curt had gone from getting off two or three or more times a day to just one hurried daily jack-off session, and he'd become really fucking horny, which was wearing him down. He'd gone over to Diego's place that morning in hopes of finding Diego and some privacy to suck, fuck, get off together, and instead he had found Berto, alone and looking freshly awakened, and Curt couldn't resist the temptation. Good thing he had been able to find the artifact. Berto even offered it up, probably not realizing what Diego had been using it to do to him!

Just the memory of his episode with Berto, getting the guy under the artifact's influence, getting him naked, getting him to suck cock and jack himself off while he did it, was making Curt's dick wake up. He stroked it through his shorts, felt the small hardness of the artifact tucked in his pocket alongside it. Now that he had the thing, what would he do with it? Yeah, he and Diego definitely should have made a pact to train each other's brother. That would've been a lot easier for Curt than having to train his own.

Curt exited back into the bedroom he was sharing with Trace. They were in the process of staying up late, sitting on the floor and playing a high-adrenaline video game, trash-talking, jostling each other, like old times. They had the upstairs entirely to themselves since their parents slept on the ground floor. Trace had stayed glued to Curt's side almost nonstop from the moment the older swimmer had gotten home from college days ago. Normally, that would have amused Curt, having his kid brother bask in his more mature radiance, but Trace's constant proximity increasingly reminded Curt of his agreement with Diego. And now Curt knew Diego had gone through with his side of the pact with Berto! Curt felt the pressure was on him now.

Earlier that evening, when they settled down to play, Curt had yanked his T-shirt up over his head--since being introduced to the artifacts, wearing clothing always seemed alien to him, and he took every chance he could to strip off his shirt, maybe go down to just his team underwear too. Some weird curiosity made him want to see whether Trace would follow suit, and sure enough, just a few minutes into the game, at the first lull in the action, Trace did, baring his slimmer torso and the little nubs garnishing his pecs. So now the older brother unhitched his jeans and kicked them off, ignoring Trace's teasing comment about, "Ooo, sexy underwear, bro! Can't you afford anything with a seat covering your butt?" Yeah, like Trace hadn't made that comment before, every time he'd seen Curt strip to his underwear the last few days.

But Trace took the bait and stripped off his shorts too, settling back in his briefs to resume play. Curt eyed the teenager's tight little ass in the clinging underwear and the generous mound cradled in the front. He could see the outline of the kid's meaty peter in the pouch, a ridge angled off to one side. Yeah, Trace had all of the right stuff in all the right places. If he had been just another teammate and not his little brother, Curt would definitely have made a move on him.

Stripping to his team briefs was the most that Curt would allow himself. Being shirtless was like playing at being macho, sitting around their bedroom bare-chested with his kid brother, and shucking his jeans seemed like upping the manhood stakes, but dropping his underwear would have been pushing too far for Curt, in spite of his agreement with Diego. Curt was too horny, too used to getting off multiple times a day, and he just didn't trust himself. He both wanted and didn't want to go through with seducing Trace.

Trace had cavorted around in just his underwear for the rest of the evening, making a couple of trips to the kitchen to fetch drinks for both of them. Each time he returned, his briefs seemed to have been scrunched lower on his hips. In spite of his hesitancy over his pact with Diego, Curt admitted to himself that his little brother was turning into a very do-able stud, and he had to struggle not to get an erection.

When the two ended their game and logged off. Trace pulled himself onto his bed and leaned back against the headboard, one knee cocked up, highlighting the wad of meat in his crotch. Curt couldn't help washing his eyes over the teenager's frame, the unintentionally seductive pose, and he felt a knot in his stomach as his cock twitched inside his team briefs. Yeah, Trace's pose made apparent that he was endowed as well as any ready-to-go stud.

Trace scratched at the tube in the front of his underpants. "Fuck. I'm, like, stupid-horny," he complained.

"'Stupid-horny'?"

Trace scratched at his nuts bagged in his briefs. "Yeah, like, when you're so horny you'll do something stupid just 'cause you need to get off." He cut his eyes at Curt's crotch. "You must love college--you can get laid any time you want."

"Pretty much," Curt chuckled, thinking about his teammates' ever-available cocks and mouths and asses.

"Lucky you. I'm gonna go in the bathroom and jack off," Trace groused. "Or I can stay here and we can do it together, if you wanna join me?"

Curt paused. Had Trace really just suggested they jack off together? Or was he playing some game? Maybe his kid brother wasn't as innocent as he'd thought. While he considered this new perspective, Curt asked, "You beat off with guys a lot?"

"Sure! I jack off with my friends all the time. It's a lot more fun than doing off by myself, and you get to see what the other guy's packing. Maybe you don't have to jack off now you're in college and getting laid all the time, but didn't you do it with your friends before? Like Diego?--You ever seen him naked?"

Curt decided Trace had to be teasing, a dare, seeing how far he could push before Curt blinked. He decided to play along. "Sure. We've been on the swim team together since ninth grade. I've seen him naked zillions of times."

"Ever seen him hard? I bet he's got a big one."

Bigger than you'd believe, Curt thought. "Why are you so interested in Diego's cock tonight?"

"His brother Berto, he's got a big one. I saw it a lot in the locker room after swim practice, but never hard. I tried to get him to jack off with me a couple of times, but he's too shy. So I was wondering if it gets as big hard as it looks soft. I figured you might have seen Diego's ...?"

"Yeah, Diego's got a big one."

"Cool!--I knew it! I like jacking off with guys who have big ones. Mine's pretty middle-sized. I wish it was bigger."

"Every guy wishes his was bigger. I'm sure you're hung just fine."

Trace grinned. "Yeah? Wanna see it?" He tugged down the front of his briefs and his cock flopped out, three-quarters hard and stretching. "What do you think? Will I measure up as a college guy?" Trace's eyes raked up and down Curt's body. "You've got a really nice body, Curt," Trace beamed as he openly admired his brother's physique. "I wish I was built like you."

Caught off-guard by the compliment, Curt smiled back and shrugged his shoulders. "You're getting there, squirt. Hell, just you wait--a few months on the college team, and you'll be amazed at the results."

"You think so?" Trace grinned. He gripped the base of his cock, made it wave back and forth. "What about my cock? Is it big enough for college? I don't want to be the smallest guy there."

Curt's cock twitched in response. Was his horniness interfering with his judgment? He couldn't forget the battle he was having with his cock or the pact he had made with Diego, but Curt stepped up to the bed and appraised the teenager's body, mentally comparing Trace's cock to his own. "There's nothing wrong with your body or your dick. You look just like me when I was your age. If you want to bulk up some, you just need to work out more with weights. The team will get you on a good program." Yeah, steer this talk of dicks back to a safer subject.

"I do that at the gym every day after work. My muscles are hard," Trace countered, rubbing one palm over his abs. "See? Tight and hard, right? I'll bet my abs are as firm as yours. Wanna feel?"

Curt wanted to feel, but knew if he did, his lust would win and he wouldn't be able to hold back any longer.

Trace unexpectedly grabbed Curt's wrist and pulled Curt's hand to his abdomen, just above his navel. Curt's fingers contacted his brother's hard muscle and smooth skin. Curt felt himself gulp. As much as he knew he should pull his hand back, he wanted to leave it where it was--or reach just a little lower to where Trace's hard cock jutted out and up a few inches below Curt's hand. Trace's abs felt warm and solid. "You seem like you're in shape to me," Curt managed to croak. He stood there beside the bed with his palm soldered to Trace's stomach. All the while his own cock pulsed to even more hardness in his team briefs, his balls demanding relief.

Trace's hand shot up to cup Curt's crotch. "Yours is the same size as mine? Take it out--I wanna see it. Please?"

"What are you doing?" the twenty-year-old asked in a throaty whisper. He could sense Trace's hand inching its way higher along his briefs, the younger fingers walking toward his waistband. Their eyes locked, searching the other's expression for the first sign of alarm--or permission. Then Curt felt his own fingers slide down the last millimeters to graze along the length of Trace's shaft.

"Fuck, yeah," from Trace, a breathless whimper. His fingers reached into the waistband of Curt's team underwear, pulled down the front, but didn't quite free Curt's cock. "C'mon. Get naked and let's jack off," Trace whisper-urged. "I wanna see."

Curt took a step back, away from Trace's cock, away from Trace's hand about to grasp Curt's dick. "Jackin' off's fun, but have you ever done more than that with a guy?"

Trace dropped his eyes, suddenly turned back into the shy younger brother Curt had been afraid of seducing, instead of the forthright cocky younger jock who'd moments before been talking about jacking off and trying to get his hands on Curt's dick. "No ... but, uh, I've thought about it sometimes. I think I wanna try more stuff ... just to see what it's like. I tried to talk one of my friends into blowing me, but he didn't want to."

"Would you have blown him back?"

Trace's confidence was returning. "Sure. Fair's fair, right? Have you ever tried doing something with a guy?"

Curt knew they were reaching a point where they could no longer turn back. He realized that Trace had been looking for an excuse to get naked and sexual with him all evening long. The stripping down to his underwear while they were playing the video game, the treks to the kitchen with his briefs getting lower with each trip, finally showing off his hard cock and reaching for Curt's. Trace probably thought getting a few of his friends to drop their pants and jack off together made him a master at seduction, so he must have been wondering why Curt just wasn't picking up on his hints, when all along Curt was struggling with the pact he'd made with Diego to be the one to seduce Trace. Apparently Trace knew what he wanted but not how to ask for it. And what Curt had to give him would mean something the kid wasn't expecting ... But it was inevitable anyway--once Trace joined the swim team, he'd be introduced to ... And then the fact they were brothers wouldn't matter anymore because they'd be teammates, and teammates were always willing to ... So whether Coach, or Diego, or someone else was the one who brought Trace into the fold, it was going to ... At least if Curt was the one, he could ensure ...

Trace's bravado had made the situation clearer, and Curt made his decision. "Sure," he answered. Then more confidently himself: "Yeah, I've done stuff with guys."

"Really?" Trace's eyes widened. "Like sucking? Ass stuff too? Who was it?"

"Let's just say all the swim team members take care of their teammates' needs."

Trace's eyes widened further; his jaw dropped. "Really? You're not shittin' me? Everyone on the team does it?"

"Yeah. In twos, or threes, or sometimes"--several times a week--"all of us together after practice. It's like an incentive. Coach and Master Tom say the team performs better when the guys' sexual needs are taken care of."

"'Master Tom'? Who's that? Like a sensei or something?"

"He's"--the guy who controls us, the one all of us, even Coach, obey without question, our master--"the guy who developed a special training program for us ... and he taught us a lot about sexual stuff."

"Like how to do it and all? Everyone on the team does it? Wow, I never thought about ... Sooo, when I'm on the team I'll have to do it too?"

"Yeah. Fair's fair, like you said. And besides"--you'll be under Master Tom's control too--"it feels good, knowing you're helping out your buddies and they're helping you out too. But just giving and getting pleasure isn't enough--skill is important too. You gotta do a good job, gotta know what you're doing." Bait dangled--would Trace go for it? And if he did, would Curt be able to go through with it?

"Can you ... uhm ... Can you teach me ... how to do some of that other stuff? I mean, I don't want to get to college and have the guys on the team laugh at me 'cause all I've ever done is kid stuff like jacking off."

"No one will laugh at you. I'd never done anything with a guy before college myself. I had to learn, and the team taught me. We all learned together."

Trace nodded, mulling these new facts. "Okay ... I still wanna ... Can you ...?"

"Can I what? Teach you to suck cock? Fuck ass? Get fucked?"

Trace looked away, blushed. In a quiet voice: "Yeah." Then, his back straightened into confidence, a decision made, and he looked Curt in the eye. "Yeah--all of that. I wanna learn. I don't wanna get to college and have the team think I'm some inexperienced hick. If there's stuff I like doing and stuff I don't like, I wanna know before I get there, so I don't make a fool of myself with the team. I know it's weird 'cause we're brothers, but I want you to ..."

"Okay. If that's what you want." Curt was surprised by how willing he felt. Maybe going through with his pact with Diego would be easier than he thought, now that he knew Trace wanted it. And wasn't that why he had gone over to Diego's house that afternoon to borrow--

Oh, right--he had the--

"Tell you what," Curt said, as if the idea was suddenly occurring to him, "I know something that will make this easier for both of us--something that'll lower our inhibitions and make us both feel real good." Curt stepped away, located his discarded jeans on the floor. He retrieved the artifact from a pocket and held it up for Trace to see.

To Trace, the inert thing probably looked like a circle of dull metal, unremarkable. "What's in it? Some kind of--" Trace mimed sniffing something off his wrist.

"No, no. It's not a drug." Curt transferred the artifact to his palm and waited. "It's something Master Tom showed us." And waited. "You might not remember after it wears off the first few times, but it feels better than any drug."

Trace looked skeptical. "If it fucks me up so bad I won't remember, what's the point?"

Why wasn't the damned artifact activating? "You'll start remembering eventually. Took a while for me, at least. The first several times, you'll wake up and you'll know you had a massive orgasm, stronger than any you've ever felt before, but you won't remember anything much about it. You'll still feel the afterglow part. That part'll stay with you for a few hours. Feels real good. Just trust me, okay?"

"Okay. But I bet I'll remember."

"Think so, squirt?"

"I know so! I bet I'll remember everything."

Curt smirked a little, knowing his kid brother had no clue what was about to happen--once the damned artifact woke up and started doing its thing. Come on, dammit!

"So ... What does it do? How does it work?" Trace obviously was growing impatient. "Or you can just show me some stuff without it. C'mon, I'm real horny. I need get off real bad." He shifted, slipped his briefs the rest of the way off and, naked, sat cross-legged the bed, his cock standing at maybe three-quarters hardness. "Here, can I see it?" Trace held out his hand, palm up.

"I think I'd better hold on to it. It's kind of old and--" Curt began.

"Oh, come on. What's the big deal?" Abruptly Trace leaned forward, and his hand swiped the artifact off of Curt's palm.

"Hey! Give it back," Curt barked, keeping his voice down so their parents downstairs wouldn't hear, and he lunged for Trace's hand.

"Nope!" Trace yelped as he rolled aside, bare skin sliding underneath Curt's. Trace's hand and the artifact were barely out of Curt's reach. Then something changed in Trace's expression, eyes widening in surprise. "Oh," he said, as if suddenly understanding some puzzle. "Oh," he said again quietly, body giving a shiver and going slack as, in his open palm, the artifact began to unfurl and glow and the effect washed over them both.

Curt smirked, feeling the effect, the rush, travel through his nervous system too, feeling his cock and horniness rise. He could surf the effect for a while but knew Trace was probably already lost in it. "Not so ... cocky now ... ar' ya ..."

Trace was still. His expression had softened, gone far away, eyes locked on the artifact, the wing-like membranes that seemed to turn in a slow, complex dance. "Oh ...," he said again, softly.

"Thass it ... Watch closely," Curt told him. His team underwear. Curt needed to get out of his team underwear, and he did, moving clumsily thanks to the soporous effect that made thinking and moving so difficult.

"Better ... take that ..." Curt eased the artifact from Trace's palm, transferred it to sit on the bedside table, and he smiled at the way Trace's gaze tracked it the whole way. Yeah, his little brother was gone, stoned, hard-dazed by the effect--and judging by the way his exposed cock was throbbing, Trace was sure feeling good. "Like that ... huh? ... Way yer feelin'?"

"Yuh," Trace said, making the slightest nod, dazed eyes not leaving the glowing artifact.

"Good ...," Curt managed. He could do this. He knew what Master Tom had said to the team many times. Now he just had to say the words to Trace. "Just breathe ... Deep ... Slow ... Don't fight it ... Let it do its work ... Keep looking into ... Gonna happen on its own ... Just relax ... Enjoy ... No worries ... No distractions ... Listen to my voice ... Look deep ... Let it take control ... Relax ... Breathe ... Take ya down ... into trance ... Like going t' sleep ... Can't stop it ... Don't wanna stop it ... Want it t' happen ... Like going t' sleep ... Trance ... Feels so good ..."

"Yuuuh," Trace said again, voice sluggish, eyes only half-open now and easing lower.

"Deeper ... Like sleep ... Trance ... No distraction ... Focus ... My voice ... What you feel ... Relax ... Let it ... Trance ... Feels so good ... Deeper and deeper ... Feels better and better ... Enjoy ... Listen ... Obey ... So easy ... Obey ... Trance ... Deep trance ... Sleep now ... Deep trance ... My voice ... You feel ... Obey ... Deep trance ..."

Trace gave a quiet sigh as his barely open eyelids flickered.

"Good ... Deep trance ... Ready ... Obedient ... Obey ... Right?"

A quiet sound from Trace: "Uhrr ..."

"Good ... You like it ... a lot ... Understand ... yer part of ... a team ... Team helps each other ... Helps ..." Curt eased himself on the bed with Trace. "So easy ... Obey ... Roll over ... All fours ..."

Trace tried to move a little but couldn't seem to remember how. Curt had to help, soon had his naked brother on his hands and knees on the mattress, legs apart, and Curt knelt between them. He felt as if his body was moving on auto-pilot too, as if he was no longer in control of deciding what to do. Curt felt like he was watching as his hands, one on each cheek, gripped Trace's ass, parting the halves, revealing the crevice and starfish hole inside. Curt's body leaned forward, and his tongue licked. He tasted Trace's musk and sweat.

"Mmm," Trace groaned again as Curt's tongue wet his hole.

"Like that ...," Curt said between licks, not sure whether he was giving an order or stating a fact.

"Yennn," Trace murmured, voice low.

Curt thought maybe Trace pushed back just the faintest amount, as if trying to capture more of the tongue jabbing at his butthole. For Curt, that was the cue to let himself go, and he let his body take over, let his teeth nip at the hard-muscled rounds of Trace's firm cheeks, let his tongue spread saliva along the hairless divide, and let his tongue drill at the little anus. A year ago, the idea of licking a guy's ass would have disgusted Curt, and here he was doing it enthusiastically to his brother.

Curt heard himself say, "Want me ... stick my dick ... up yer ass ...," and again he wasn't sure whether this was a question or an order.

Either way, Trace responded with, "Yehz ..."

"Good ... Soon ... Get ya ready ... Get ... on yer back ..."

As Trace sagged down onto the sheets and rolled himself face-up, Curt's body had already scooted forward, turned, and reached into Trace's bedside table for the jack-off lube secreted in the drawer, the lube his younger brother probably didn't think Curt knew about. As he slicked a finger with the lube, Curt murmured, "Focus on artifact ... and how ya feel ... Stay relaxed ... Feel better ..."

Curt didn't have to remind Trace to focus on the artifact. The effect it was washing over them was inescapable, even if they weren't looking at it. Trace's face stayed sort-of aimed in its direction.

Curt lifted his brother's legs, curled them to his chest, knees apart. "Stay ..." Trace held the pose. The angle lifted his butthole up, and Curt slipped that lube-slick finger between the cheeks and tapped gently at the puckered entrance. When Curt pushed, his finger slid into the tightness. Another push and deeper still. A slow in-and-out, out to awaken and stimulate the nerves in the asshole, and in to search for the magic prostate. His other hand cupped Trace's balls, weighed them, fondled the skin, rolled them with his fingers. Trace made a sound that ended as a whimper of pleasure. Yeah, his brother was deeply gone into the artifact's influence. Everything Curt did to him would feel good.

Curt's hand on his brother's balls shifted upward, circled the cock-shaft, lifted it away from Trace's belly. Curt bent forward and licked at the cock-tip as he slipped a second finger into the younger swimmer's ass. When Curt put his mouth over the cock-head and began to swallow as he slowly finger-stroked the butthole, Trace made a faint writhing motion and a "Hrrauh" leaked out of his throat. A third finger. Another incoherent sound of pleasure. Nearly ready.

Curt's mouth pulled away from the cock. Couldn't let Trace cum too soon. Not with so much to be done. He hoisted the guy's ankles and rested them on his shoulders, then set about generously slicking lubricant over his cock. "May hurt ... at first ... Focus on pleasure ... Artifact ... Let ... pain ... flow away ..."

Curt's body knew what to do and did it, pushing forward, making Trace's tight hole start to yield, pushing. Curt's cock was average-sized. Good thing he was Trace's first, part of him thought--because Diego's big dick would have split Trace in half.

Curt's hips pushed again, and the head broke past the sphincter and into Trace's ass. "Hraah," his brother moaned, a tight sound. A protest? Pleasure? Curt didn't care. He hip-pushed again, feeding more cock into Trace's butt, and together his hand began feather-stroking Trace's cock as his dick moved in and out of Trace's ass.

His thrusts timed with the recitation. "Focus ... Gonna feel so good ... You belong to ... the team ... Takin' care of them ... Them takin' care of ya ... Feel so good ... Breathe deep ... Deep trance ... Obey ... Belong ... Feel so good ..."

Trace, his mostly closed eyes still pointed toward the artifact, gradually stopped moaning and started breathing little sighs of pleasure. His balls began to ride up--

Slow down. Curt slowly eased his cock out of its new home in that ass. "Stretch out ... Gonna enjoy ..." He slathered lube on two fingers and reached back to probe his own hole, drizzling lubricant over Trace's cock with his other. Soon Curt's body straddled Trace's hips. He squatted, lowered himself, guiding Trace's cock until the slick cock-head penetrated Curt's fuck-hole. After a moment of hesitation as Trace's meaty flange stalled at Curt's sphincter, the weight of the older swimmer won out. The cock pushed through and Curt sat down all the way to Trace's pelvis. Curt was fully impaled on his brother's stiff dick and he felt like the breath had been kicked out of his lungs.

A few moments later he recovered and began to pump his hips up and down, fucking his brother's cock in and out of his ass. "Feel so good ... Belong to the team ... Feel so good ... Breathe deep ... Deep trance ... Obey ... Belong ...," he chanted as he rode Trace's cock.

After the merest minutes--too soon!--Trace's body shivered, gave the familiar signs of approaching orgasm. The horny kid must have a quick trigger, Curt thought distantly. They'd need to work on endurance, but later. He slid off the cock and, between Trace's parted knees, lifted his legs again and reinserted his cock in Trace's ass. This time, the hole was still loosened, so it fit easier. Curt fucked him face-to-face, a hand rubbing Trace's cock, and recited the instructions Trace needed to hear.

Hardly a minute in--less?--Trace gasped, and his body tensed, and this time his orgasm was unstoppable. He groaned as his cum shot out, the thick string of it spurting across his chest, a second, third, and the rest oozing out. Another several seconds of continued muscle tension, and then Trace's body relaxed, spent, limp.

Curt pulled out and jacked himself as best his artifact-clumsy muscles could manage. The look on Trace's face--his body lying there--resistance, mental and physical, completely gone--completely under the artifact's influence--too much! Curt began to cum hard, so hard, so ...

5. Trace and Diego: Interlude

Trace's first thought when he awoke to his phone chirping at five a.m., like every day, and reached to shut it off was, Never woulda taken the lifeguard job if I'd known they were gonna give me the early shift! This was immediately followed by, Holy shit!--I'm naked!--And Curt's in bed with me!--And he's naked too!

Trace climbed slowly from the bed, not wanting to disturb Curt, who made a vague grumbling as the bed moved but didn't wake. Trace shook his head and grinned--He can sleep through anything.

Last night was a blur. As he stood there beside the bed and scratched his free-swinging balls, he remembered the video game marathon, just like they used to do before Curt went off to college. He remembered Curt had started stripping down, and he'd done the same, because he liked mimicking his older brother and because he didn't want Curt to think he was still some shy hick-town kid anymore. He remembered trying every trick he could think of to get Curt horny enough to jack off with him, and Curt saying that was kid stuff. And he remembered Curt said something about showing him something that would something-something-something, only he probably wouldn't remember it later. What the fuck was it? Curt had been right--the memory was just gone. Not hazy or jumbled, like all the facts Trace had cram-memorized in school for history tests, but just not there.

What had Curt shown him? What had they done? Trace took stock. His asshole burned, his cock and balls felt heavy and spent, and he had what looked like dried cum on his chest, and all he knew absolutely for sure was he'd had the best orgasm of his life. Fuck, yeah! He'd had sex! Real sex!--Not just that jack-off shit; that shit was for kids--Curt had said so. They'd had sex, and the burning in his ass was proof he'd gotten fucked. Curt had taken his cherry, and now Trace was a man. Yeah! About damn time! Now, thanks to Curt, Trace wasn't a kid anymore; he was a real man ready for college, ready for more real sex, and he couldn't wait for it to happen again. He was already horny again. Was this what adult sex was like?--A deep itch that needed to be scratched, and scratched, and scratched? He just wished he could remember everything they'd done. Heck, maybe he could wake Curt up right now and they'd do it all again? This time Trace would remember every moment for sure!

No, no time. Trace had just enough time to get dressed and get to the gym for his shift. More sex would have to wait. He grabbed a fresh pair of white briefs, pulled it on. Baggy red lifeguard shorts. Sneakers. White T-shirt with Guard written in red across the chest and the back. His backpack. Reached for his phone and keys.

What's that? Some little metal disk on the bedside table next to his phone? What the fuck was it? Was that what Curt had shown him? No time to think about that now. He'd take it along, maybe study it later. Trace swept up the disk along with his phone and shoved both items in his backpack and crept out the door to not disturb Curt.

# # #

His shift ended at noon. Finally! Trace burst from the gym into the hot summer sunshine and sprinted to the rack where his bicycle was chained.

Just thinking about what he and Curt did last night--or imagining what they probably did, if only he could remember--had Trace kept horny as hell all morning, the lingering soreness in his ass a constant reminder, and his tingling balls and semi-hard cock had been significant distractions. Dammit! He had been a man for less than twelve hours, and he was already desperate to do it all again.

The bike ride home normally took about fifteen minutes, but if he pedaled extra-hard, maybe he could make it in ten? His parents wouldn't be home for hours. That left plenty of time for Trace to get home and seduce Curt into an afternoon of sex that this time he'd surely remember. But even if Curt wasn't home, Trace's balls needed relief, so no Curt would mean he'd have to call one of his buddies to meet up and swap hand-jobs, or maybe do more if Trace could convince him--or if no one was available, Trace would have to spend a good chunk of the afternoon jacking off like usual. His cock and balls needed relief and he couldn't be particular!

The moment he mounted his bike, the erection he had been staving off all morning hit, and his cock was almost painfully hard in his shorts. His legs pumping the pedals caused a friction on his cock that was both wonderful and torment. Halfway home, coming up on an abandoned gas station he and his friends sometimes used as a hideout for privacy and jerking off together, Trace had decided the horniness was too much. He needed release right then and there. Maybe he'd just stop in, pump off a quick load, and then head home. Yeah, that sounded good: he'd relieve his balls and take the edge off, so he'd last longer when he got home and got Curt naked and into bed. Genius! he congratulated himself.

He pulled around back of the derelict gas station, left his bike leaned against the wall, and crept through the door with the busted lock. The dusty interior looked exactly like it had last time he was there, a week ago, so probably no one had been there since.

Trace was sweaty from pedaling, decided he'd better take a shower as soon as he got home. Unless Curt liked sweaty guys? Or maybe he could get Curt naked and pull him into the shower too for shower sex? Fuck!--Now Trace really needed to jack off!

He shrugged off his backpack. Shorts and briefs pushed down to his ankles. Shirt tugged up to his nipples. No need to get naked just for a quick relief-jack; just needed the essentials freed. His free-swinging cock bobbed in the musty heat. He knelt next to the ancient mattress someone had dragged into the gas station long ago and he rummaged in his pack, wanting his phone so he could watch a favorite porn video while he stroked. He knew he was almost too excited already, but that was fine; this stroke-off was just a quick stress reliever. Porn always made jacking-off hotter--and now he needed to gather some ideas to try out with Curt.

Where the fuck was his phone? He didn't have a lot of stuff in his pack, but somehow his phone always seemed to end up at the bottom, hidden under everything else. Ah, there it was! And what was this? Oh, right--that dumb little metal slug he'd found on his bedside table--he'd meant to examine it during his break at work but hadn't had the time. He looked at it in his palm. It was just a plain disk, didn't look like anything remarkable. So what was Curt doing with it? And, wait--did he just feel it move a little ...

# # #

Trace took a deep breath. Somehow, the world had just ... gone away for a while. What the fuck had happened? His legs were sore from kneeling. His cock had gone soft from inactivity. The sunlight through the dusty windows had a different angle. He checked his phone. Two hours later than he thought? What the fuck happened and where had all that time gone? Why couldn't he remember what happened--for two whole hours? Was this little disk-thingee somehow responsible?

Spooked, Trace wasn't horny any longer. Now he needed to get home to talk to Curt for a different reason. Curt would explain everything.

Then they'd have sex.

Arriving home, Trace stashed his bike in the usual spot. He eased the front door open, entered, and closed it quietly behind himself. Maybe he could sneak upstairs, catch Curt naked and ready to be seduced, maybe even waiting for Trace and stroking a little already. Trace's stomach rumbled. Detour by the kitchen for a quick snack? No!--Sex first! Priorities!

He crept up the stairs, careful to avoid the well-known spots that squeaked. As he neared the bedroom door, he heard voices, not even bothering to whisper, probably thinking they were alone. Curt and whoever he was talking to didn't seem angry, not exactly, but they did sound frustrated with each other. Something about it being a problem, and their coach being pissed with them when he found out, and how they had to tell him it was missing. Trace wondered what this it might be, and he edged closer to the quarter-open bedroom door.

The door made a noise and Curt's buddy Diego turned in his direction. At first Diego didn't look happy to see Trace wide-eyed in the doorway, but then he smiled knowingly. "Hey, squirt," he practically purred. "How's it going? C'mon in. Me and Curt were just having a conversation."

Diego and Curt were standing in the bedroom. They were both stripped to their underwear, identical blue backless briefs--which made sense to Trace--team underwear, Curt had called it, so naturally they both wore them since they were both on the swim team, but why had they stripped to their undies? Had he interrupted them about to jack off together? The Latino stud looked almost exactly like his brother, Trace's friend Berto, and if this was what Berto was going to look like in two more years, wow! Trace tried inconspicuously to memorize Diego's nearly bare body--the muscular chest, flat stomach, strong thighs--but he couldn't help but stare at the large bulge in the crotch. Holy crap! Was that real? Was he hung as big as his brother Berto?--Bigger?

Trace yanked his gaze upward. Shit! Diego had definitely caught him checking out his crotch! "Uh ... Uh ...," Trace heard himself stammering. Was Diego's underwear pouch getting even bigger?

Diego's knowing smile took on an unreadable slant. "Let's see how the training's going."

Which didn't make sense to Trace, but he had walked in during their conversation--maybe this was what they were discussing before?

Diego turned back to Trace and said, "Okay, squirt, let's see your dedication to the team. Strip."

Strip? Well, they were in their underwear. Maybe this was a swim team thing? Or was Diego inviting him to strip down and join them for jacking off or maybe even sex? A three-away? Cool! Trace had just become a man and already he was about to have his first three-way! Trace rushed out of his lifeguard shirt, toed his way out of his sneakers at the same time and nearly fell over. He shoved down his shorts and stood before Diego in his underwear. Trace's cock was getting hard quickly, and that was perfect, because he was pretty sure Diego was hard too, and they were about to--

"Eager little fucker, aren't you, squirt? Good enthusiasm," Diego appraised. "But I said 'strip'--all the way."

Was this just a way to get him naked? Or some kind of dare, like a game of chicken?--Guys testing each others' limits to see who'd be the first to blink? Well, Trace would show his brother and Diego he wasn't a chickenshit kid. He was a man now! If they wanted to use a game to justify getting naked, Trace would show them he wasn't afraid and played to win. He zipped his briefs down and stood up, naked, his erection bouncing out in front of him, practically daring them to look.

"Not bad," Diego said. Trace thought Diego meant to sound casual but he was sure he heard sparks of horniness in the older swimmer's voice. Yeah, Trace's friends sounded the same way sometimes, when they were showing off their erections like it was no big deal and trying to disguise how much they wanted to jack off together. Trace could play this game too, and he was going to win!

"Kneel," Diego ordered, pointing to the floor in front of his feet. When Trace hesitated, "Kneel," Diego repeated more forcefully.

Trace went to his knees approximately where Diego had pointed. The position put his face uncomfortably close to Diego's crotch. Surely the older swimmer wasn't going to--

Diego hooked his thumbs in the waistband of his briefs and pushed them down enough. His cock sprang out. "Lick it."

Trace stared at the stiff cock directly in front of him. He had seen about eight, maybe ten, hard-ons in real life--his jack-off friends, teammates throwing awkward rods in the showers or locker room--and lots more in porn videos. Diego's was big, not the biggest he'd seen in porn but definitely the biggest he'd seen in real life. And Diego had just said to lick it? Surely he wasn't going to make Trace suck something that big? How would he ever fit it in his mouth?

Licking didn't seem so bad, though, so Trace stuck out his tongue. The first contact--his tongue against the skin of Diego's shaft halfway along--surprised him. He had expected the skin to feel more like licking an arm or something, hadn't expected it to feel so silky, hadn't expected the way it moved over the hard shaft it covered, like velvet cloth wrapped over an iron rod. And the taste wasn't like licking an arm at all; salty, yes, but the skin here tasted muskier and completely different. Trace slid the flat of his tongue along Diego's shaft. The taste wasn't bad; he could get used to it. Plus, he wanted to prove to Diego--Curt too--that he wasn't a chickenshit and wasn't going to let a stiff cock intimidate him into losing this game. Besides, while he would have preferred doing this to Curt, Diego was hot-looking too, and Trace wanted to do this, wanted to learn, so he could do a good job when he got Curt's cock in his mouth, hopefully soon.

Trace fluttered the tip of his tongue into Diego's gapping cum-hole, imitating what he had seen in porn videos. Diego moaned, and Trace felt oddly encouraged to try more, go further. He lapped around the thick curbing of flesh around the glans, then opened his jaw as far as he could and took the older stud's plum-shaped flange into his mouth. Seeing that cock-head in front of him and feeling it bumping around in his craw were different situations, and Trace gagged a little from the size of it, but soon he had all of the head and a third of the shaft down his greedy throat.

Trace hoped he was a quick study. Porn made cock-sucking look so easy, the way one actor would say I've never done this before and then immediately glomp the other actor's bigger-than-average cock all the way down to the root. Trace figured out quickly that he couldn't go that far that fast, not on a large-ish cock like Diego's. Porn provided the ideas, but Trace would have to figure out the methods himself.

Okay, so a third of the shaft was all he could handle. Maybe that would be enough? He could use his hand to stroke the rest. Trace separated his mouth from Diego's cock and returned to flicking the tip of his tongue around the older youth's piss-slit. Then he swabbed the crown with saliva before returning it to his throat. He felt Diego's hands rest on his skull, holding his head in place, and then Diego's hips began to move--slow, shallow strokes that stopped just short of Trace's gag reflex. He's fucking my face! Trace exulted, deciding he kind-of liked this. All he had to do was focus on how to use his lips to protect the shaft from his teeth, flatten his tongue, and try not to gag. He was doing this!

"Yeah, horny little fucker." Diego seemed to be sensing Trace's comfort level. Just as Trace began to adjust to Diego's thrusts, the older swimmer would increase the depth just a little, his hips picking up speed just a little too. Trace tried to pull back a time or two, but Diego's grip held his head in place, forcing Trace to get used to what was happening, which somehow he did.

When Diego abruptly pulled his cock from Trace's mouth, Trace tried to pursue it, but Diego's hands on his head prevented motion. Diego jacked himself with one hand--quick, efficient strokes--while his other stayed on Trace's head. Diego moaned, "Fuck--gonna cum," and his body shuddered, and Trace saw the first bolt of cum jet out of Diego's cock. It slapped across Trace's cheek, hot as lava, and the second tagged the corner of his mouth, and the third hit his neck.

Diego stepped back, grinning unreadably down at Trace. "Taste my cum," Diego said.

Trace sent his tentative tongue to the corner of his mouth for a bit of Diego's load. Salty, a little bitter; not a flavor Trace would go looking for, but he figured he could get used to it.

"His cock-sucking skills need some work," Diego said, apparently to scowling Curt, "but he's got the team spirit. You got him well on the way." To Trace again, Diego said, "Okay, squirt, you can jack off now."

Trace had been hoping for a reciprocal blow-job, but mention of jacking off reminded him of his forgotten erection bouncing between his spread thighs. He couldn't wait any longer--needed to get off now! He fisted his rod and pumped at it enthusiastically. He didn't care that Diego and Curt were watching. He had to shoot off and fast!

The beginning hit him after barely ten fast strokes, a sudden buzz in his cock and balls and then a flash: orgasm--a hard explosion of mind-numbing, face-scrunching pleasure that took over his existence for a while.

When Trace's climax started to fade, leaving him kneeling on the floor, sweaty and panting and still stained with Diego's cum, Diego himself had left. Trace stayed where he was and looked up at Curt.

His underwear-clad brother eyed him with an evaluating stare. "You did good. Better than I expected. But one time with the artifact wouldn't have done all that. You wanted to do it. Did you like sucking his cock?"

"I ... Uh, I guess--kind of. Is that all right?" Still orgasm-dazed, Trace wondered whether he was in trouble. He'd thought they were going to have a three-way, but Diego had left and Curt didn't sound happy, not at all. Had Trace misjudged the situation? And what was this artifact Curt mentioned?

"It's fine, squirt. Maybe better than fine. Makes things a lot easier, in a way." He sauntered closer. "But you've got some explaining to do. We nearly tore the room apart looking for it. You took it, didn't you?"

Took what? The artifact he'd mentioned, maybe? What the hell could Trace have taken?

Realization dawned on him. "Wait--!"

His backpack--where had his left his backpack? Downstairs? No, there it was by the door where he'd left his clothes. Trace scuttled over on his hands and knees and grabbed his pack. He dug inside. Phone ... spare charger ... the little bottle of jack-off lube ... a condom he carried just in case ... Where the fuck had it gotten to?

There it was!

He held up the little coin disk-thingee? "You mean this?"

"That's it," Curt grumbled as he snatched the artifact from Trace's fingers. "Diego thinks I lost it. Don't worry--I didn't say anything about you probably taking it. No one's supposed to know about this thing."

"I'm sorry. I just wanted to look at it. I've just been so horny all day, and, uh--"

"That's what it does--keeps you horny all the time, and makes you crave how it makes you feel. I think maybe it's addictive."

"Huh?"

Curt looked at the artifact, raised an eyebrow. "Heh. I think it likes you, squirt. Think you can cum again?"

"Fuck, yeah!" Trace gushed, wanting to taste his brother's cock and cum, compare it to Diego's, wanting even more to bury his cock in Curt's throat too and fuck his face like Diego had fucked his.

Curt smirked. "Good answer." He held his upturned palm down, the artifact opening in the center, where Trace could see it. "Just look deeply into it."

And for Trace, the world just went away again ...

6. Coach Buzz and Charlie: One Year Ago

Summer semester. Coach Beaumont Thompson, Buzz to his friends, liked coming to campus and his small office in the gymnasium even though he wasn't teaching a class this semester and his swim team members had scattered to whatever small towns they called home. He lived alone since his divorce, and coming here gave him a sense of continuity. Also, someone was always around at the gym--summer term students working out, staff members going about their jobs. Buzz didn't mind living alone, not really, but the emotional wounds from his ex-wife and the divorce were still fresh and he disliked being alone; being around people during the day made being solo at night tolerable. And no way was he ready for dating again, or even hookups--not yet.

He hadn't been a coach long, just a few years overall and two years at this school. He'd almost qualified for the Olympics during his last year of competing, but a lot of guys almost qualified and that counted for little in the job market. Still, he'd gotten a position as an assistant coach, and then wrangled the coaching job here at this college. At thirty-one he liked to think his relative youth helped him connect with his team. They looked up to him like an older brother. He was respected, a good coach, a good teacher. And he'd gotten good at fending off the hero-worshipping puppy love sometimes offered him by his swimmers. He wasn't interested in guys, and he wasn't interested in taking advantage of his authority over his swimmers.

Buzz had worked out in the weigh room earlier, keeping his body in shape. He didn't swim as much as he used to, because of his schedule, and truth be told, he was starting to pick up a taste for whiskey during those nights alone, just enough to get tipsy, so these days he ran to burn the calories and lifted weights to keep himself trim and fit. He wanted to avoid becoming one of those coaches who let themselves go after they stopped competing.

Buzz always went back to his office and washed off the sweat in the small adjoining shower alcove. He soaped his testicles carefully; aside from his daily jack-offs, his balls had been sidelined for some time now. And since--Don't shit where you live--he considered both the female students at the college and his coworkers in the Athletics Department to be off-limits for dating and sex, his balls got a lot less release lately than they were used to.

Buzz dried himself quickly. The time was after five. Time to head home, maybe pick up some salad fixings, a frozen pizza, and a fresh bottle of whiskey on the way. He checked his naked body in the mirror next to the trophy case. Not bad. Pretty good, in fact, a body most guys would love to have.

Buzz pulled the blue T-shirt over his head. He pulled on a pair of socks, then wriggled into his tight jeans, sans underwear. Zipped up. His nuts ached even more once they were trapped in their denim cage. Yeah, he'd have to go home, have a drink, and beat his meat while the pizza cooked. Maybe he'd beat off a second time before bed.

"Hi, Coach," came a voice from his doorway. "Got a minute?"

Shit!--Hadn't he locked the door? A young man, mid-twenties so probably a graduate student, stood in the doorway, holding a small, flat cardboard box.

Buzz sighed inwardly. His exciting evening of pizza, whiskey, and jacking off would have to wait. "C'mon in." Buzz sat down behind his desk and pointed to the opposite chair. Hopefully he could get rid of this guy soon, whoever he was. "Have a seat. What's your name and what can I do for you ...?"

"I'm Tom."

"What can I do for you, Tom?"

"It's what I can do for you, Coach. What if I offered you a way to train your swimmers at a whole new level. You can train them so they'll obey your every instruction, every time. You tell them to arch their arm more in a stroke? They will do exactly that, each and every stroke from then on."

Buzz tried not to roll his eyes. Was this guy crazy? Should he play along?--Humor the guy? "I'd say that's too good to be true, Tom. What's the secret?"

"These." Tom put the cardboard box on the desk. The box was only about two inches tall, several inches wide. To Buzz it looked like a small pizza box, and his stomach grumbled softly. He hoped this conversation wouldn't delay him from his own pizza much longer.

Tom opened the top. Buzz leaned forward so he could see over the lip of the box. Inside were what looked like a handful of old coins. He leaned back in his chair. "I'm sorry, Tom. I'm not a philatelist."

Tom lifted an eyebrow.

"I mean, a coin collector?" Buzz tried again.

Tom smiled. "A philatelist is a stamp collector. A coin collector is a numismatist."

Sigh. "Okay, whatever. But still--"

"And these aren't coins, Coach. They're artifacts of a--"

"Uh-huh. What does that have to do with me?"

"They generate an effect that causes extreme suggestibility. If we combine them with simple training instructions and commands, which we could develop into scripts, then we can--"

"Tom, I don’t understand a word of what you're saying." This part Buzz didn't miss during the summer: dealing with the eggheads who infested academia; they always thought everyone would find their narrow area of specialization the most interesting topic of conversation ever if they could just be made to understand it. And, wow, weren't academic focus and just plain crazy sometimes awfully hard to tell apart? "Listen, let's cut to the chase. What's this all about?"

"To be honest, Coach, I've always had a thing for swimmers, and--"

Sigh. "A sexual thing?"

"--When I learned what these artifacts can do, I knew I had a way for us to help each other."

Definitely crazy, and a pervert to boot. Buzz kept his voice low and stern, the voice of a man not to be fucked with. "I think you'd better leave, Tom, right now, before I call security."

"Let me show you what they can do, first. You'll thank me after." Tom tilted the box so that Buzz had a better view of the artifacts. He found his gaze drawn to one, which seemed to be making some tiny motion.

"And all I ask in return," Tom continued, "is for you to call me Master Tom ..."

# # #

Buzz awoke when the bare-bulbed overhead light came on. Impossible to tell in this windowless room, but assuming his captors were adhering to a set schedule, it was now morning, a new day. Another day in captivity.

He knew exactly where he was. He was in one of the unfinished basement rooms in his own house. The narrow bed was new--he hadn't done anything with the basement rooms, never needed them, had no furniture in them; someone had brought this bed in specially for him. Still, he recognized the adjoining bathroom and the bare concrete floor, so he knew where he was. Yes, definitely his own house.

On the floor next to the simple narrow bed, barely just a mattress on a frame, sat a small smart speaker device, a low twelve-by-twelve cardboard box, and the last of a stack of underwear. Buzz knew what was in that box, and he didn't like it--didn't like it at all. The tiny wireless surveillance cameras mounted in each of the ceiling corners were new additions. Buzz didn't like them either; no matter where he was in the room, his captors could watch him at any time, were likely watching him now. Perverts!

He rolled off the mattress and staggered his half-asleep body into the tiny semi-finished bathroom, which was barely big enough for a shower stall, toilet, and sink with a mirror mounted over it. The toilet was his immediate need, thanks to his urgent bladder. He pushed down the front of yesterday's underwear, a pair of blue backless briefs that he had slept in, the only clothing he was allowed. Well, he'd worn jock-straps and swimsuits often enough that the skimpiness of the briefs didn't bother him at all. He aimed his penis at the bowl and began to piss.

Finished and flushed, he tucked his cock away, rinsed his fingers by habit in the sink, and strolled back into the makeshift bedroom as he wiped the moisture on his briefs. Who the hell wore backless briefs that left their bare ass cheeks hanging out? Jock-straps were one thing--those were utilitarian--but briefs with no butt-covering to them were probably something perverts wore. Or liked looking at. Buzz flicked his eyes at the surveillance cameras. He was fit, all trim muscle, good-looking, and naked except for these butt-less briefs that were only a little better than being naked. He bet his deviant captors watched him a lot.

At the foot of his bed, Buzz stretched his shoulders and then began his jumping jacks. Calisthenics were his morning routine now, since he had nothing else to do. Even if he was going to be trapped in this room, he was still going to stay fit. Pushups, burpees, crunches, running in place. He had no way to measure time, so he had to count iterations and steps. He worked up a sweat, felt good; he enjoyed the exertion. He liked looking good, and the one good thing about being a captive was that he had plenty of time for his morning exercise ritual, which he performed almost obsessively.

He didn't remember much about the first days--he'd been unconscious for most of that time, or maybe drugged somehow. Only recently had he started to remember what happened during his days. Well, part of what happened, at least.

He eyed the door as he exercised. No obvious dangers prevented him from just walking over there and trying the knob. Maybe the door wasn't even locked. No, the dangers were almost inconspicuous: a group of four small disk-things taped to the frame around the door. Buzz didn't know what those were. All he knew was, if he went too close to them, they put him down hard and fast. He'd blacked out into those memory-less voids far too often in the early days before he learned to avoid them. They must have been radioactive, or ultrasonic, or impregnated with drugs, or something.

He ended with some yoga stretching. He wasn't sure when he had learned yoga, but somehow these poses came naturally to him. Maybe he'd seen a video or something? Being confined in this room meant stretching was important.

If he'd counted off the reps right, his routine probably took an hour. He didn't have anything else to do, so time was not in short supply. Finished, Buzz wiped his forehead with a hand and padded back into the bathroom. A quick shower. A brisk toweling-off. He thought about wrapping the towel around his waist, but why bother?--After all the times he'd woke up from those voids nude, all the showers and shits he'd taken, his captors had already seen him naked more times than he could count. He just hoped the images didn't end up online somewhere that the college administration would find them.

Buzz hung up his towel and padded bare-ass back to the bed. His captors had inadvertently given him a way to count days. When he'd woken up here the first time, a stack of seven matching backless blue pairs of underwear sat next to the bed. A fresh pair every day, assuming his captors kept the lights and his windowless days synchronized to the outside world, meant a week had passed. At the end of one stack, a fresh stack appeared the next morning. Now he picked up the next-to-last pair from the third stack. That meant he had been here a day short of three weeks. Three weeks!

With nothing else to do, Buzz made the bed, tucking in the sheet efficiently, then sat on the edge of the mattress to wait. Usually the one captor he always saw would have already left a tray of food for him on the bed during his shower, but today nothing. Obviously they were running late. He had counted off the required repetitions of everything, hadn't scrimped, so he wasn't running early. Should he be worried? If something happened to them, he wouldn't be able to escape this room. Worry about that later, he scolded himself, though now that his world was limited to this one bedroom and bathroom, what else did he have to think about? Maybe he'd jack off while he waited, give the watchers a show? Since he had little else to do during his days but exercise and jerk off, his captors had seen that show many times before, too.

"Good morning." A voice from the smart speaker.

Buzz felt ... oddly passive. Some great heaviness seemed to settle on him, muffling his thoughts. He looked up at a random surveillance camera. "Good morning, sir," he said back.

"Have you completed your morning exercises?"

"Yes, sir," Buzz replied, as the passiveness spread into a kind of wooziness, like being dazed or drunk--but also like being hyper-focused and horny, except that the eager horniness was diffused through his entire body and all his thoughts instead of just concentrated in his gonads. He felt oddly disconnected from his body, a feeling he had come to know well. He angled his face toward the door. There was the cause: One of the disks was open, little petals rotating in a slow-motion dance of blue and silver-white. Buzz was not far enough away to escape it but was away enough that the effect was light.

"What are the Three Rules?"

Buzz knew this--he knew that he knew. If only he didn't feel so ... "I serve Master Tom," he heard himself say. Well, of course he did. So obvious.

His voice continued. "I serve the team." Yes, he was part of the team, and if a team member had a need, any need at all, he would gladly do anything he could to help ...

"I serve the artifacts." He would keep them a secret. No one except those who'd been trained with them could know ...

"Good," the voice said, pulling his attention back to the speaker. "It's time for you to have a reward, don't you agree. Why don't you open the box."

Buzz felt a swell of pride; he had done something well enough to earn a reward. But the box--he didn't like its contents. He was so horny, though--the effect always made him so fucking horny, like a teenager again. He didn't like the box, but when he was this horny--

He found his body slipping off the bed, kneeling before the modest cardboard box, opening it. He knew the contents well: a realistic six-inch dildo, a beginner-sized butt plug, an L-shaped prostate massager, a small bottle of lubricant. He knew somehow that over the last three weeks each of those sex-toys had been inside his ass several times, and somehow that seemed both wrong and exciting.

The voice again: "Pick the one you want."

Buzz's hand reached for the bottle of lube and the prostate massager. The longer stalk of the L-shape would go up his ass, while the shorter foot would fit along his perineum to poke at the back of his ball sack.

"Good choice," the voice said, a hint of a snicker. "Proceed."

Buzz felt his body lie back on the cool concrete floor. The lube was open, and his hand smeared the clear liquid over the stalk of the massager. His legs rose, knees curling toward his chest. The backless briefs meant his asshole was exposed. His thoughts formed a quiet No-no-no, too far in the background to stop what was happening as his hand positioned the massager at his butt and pushed. He felt the knob-end press into his asshole. Another push and the knob slid through. An easy motion slid the rest of the stalk into him, into place.

Suddenly the massager in his ass began to buzz and vibrate gently. Remote-controlled, he realized anew, certain somehow that he already knew that. The quivering and pulsing felt weirdly good in his sphincter and against his balls, and it seemed to touch something up inside his ass that spread a pleasure through him. His cock was hard in the briefs.

"Put your legs down," the voice told him, and Buzz did, lying stretched out on the concrete, cool under his back and butt. The massage-tremors changed pattern, sending renewed frissons of bliss through him. "Take out your cock."

Buzz fumbled at the crotch of his briefs, managed to decipher the logistics of pushing down the front enough to expose his erection.

"Touch your cock. You may jerk off."

Buzz's hand circled his dick, pumped at it hard and quick. Another change of vibration pattern in his ass, and the knob inside him hit that joy-spot repeatedly. Buzz's throat choked out a sound. Some part of him knew he should feel humiliated, nearly naked and jacking-off with a toy up his butt while his captors, probably men, watched him--but something seemed exciting too, the feeling of knowing he had pleased his captors, the intoxicated way he felt whenever those coin-things opened up, at least the times he could remember. Most of his body and his thoughts were snarled in the sensations, and everything felt so damned good. He couldn't resist the forces sweeping his body toward the inevitable. He wondered what a real dick up his ass would feel like, how it would compare to the toy. That thought and the resulting flush of arousal caused his cock and balls to ignite with pleasure. Then his orgasm broke over him, sending him flying into clouds of bliss at the top of the sky, everything forgotten except the eye-scrunching euphoria that filled him to bursting, filled him, filled everything, peaked, paused, paused ... and then inevitably began to fade.

Buzz returned to himself, his body spent and limp against the floor. Warm ball-juice covered his belly and chest. He blinked up at the nearest surveillance camera, panting, and grinned.

The vibrating in his ass stopped. "Good boy. Now, go clean yourself up and put your toys away."

Buzz fumbled his way to standing, shuffled on orgasm-loose legs to the bathroom. He planned to wipe up the cum with toilet paper, but too much of it covered him. He doffed the briefs, turned on the shower again, and stepped inside to rinse away his seed, remove the massager, and wash it.

Cleaned and dried and back in his briefs, he had just tucked the lube and massager back into the box when he heard the door open. That one captor he always saw, a vaguely familiar man a few years younger than Buzz, stood there. "I thought today we should celebrate your progress these last four weeks by bringing you upstairs to have breakfast with me. But first I want you to answer one question. What is my name?" he asked.

Buzz thought about it. Four weeks?--Not three? Now that leaving the room was being offered, did he really want it? And how should he answer the man's question? Tom sounded familiar but insufficient, not quite right. The man deserved respect, an honorific. What title had the Three Rules given him? "Master Tom," Buzz said.

The man smiled. Buzz felt great, knowing that his answer had pleased the man.

Upstairs, the man placed a plate of scrambled eggs and chunks of fresh fruit in front of Buzz, and he ate eagerly. Sitting at his very own kitchen table seemed odd. That basement bedroom has been his entire world for so long--four weeks!--he couldn't quite seem to adjust to being out. The man seemed to be alone; Buzz saw no evidence of anyone else in the house with them. Buzz could stand up, run for the door, and be free. But he didn't. He sat and ate hungrily.

The man spoke about how well Buzz had progressed under his intensive training. Buzz wasn't aware of having been trained recently, but he decided that, like learning those yoga stretches, this might have been something that happened during the blank spots in his memories. Master Tom said Buzz had internalized the training quickly and deeply during his captivity, thanks to having no distractions; but they wouldn't be able do quite the same for the others, whoever Master Tom meant, because they won't have the luxury of separating the others from their daily lives. The training would work on them, certainly, but slower; the others would need a couple of months to come as far as Buzz had in just a few weeks. Buzz listened and nodded now and then when a response seemed appropriate, and continued to shovel eggs into his mouth so that he wouldn't be asked to reply.

As Buzz finished the plate, the man placed a folder on the table and pushed it toward him. "Open it." Buzz did and found the swim team roster for the coming year. If he'd been here four weeks, then classes and team practices would start in about two weeks. Now Buzz understood who the others were. Master Tom had been talking about his swim team.

The roster, a dossier page or two on each swimmer and his stats, and Buzz's notes about his strengths and areas for improvement. Master Tom wanted to know which members seemed to be the social alphas, the ringleaders that the others looked up to, the ones they needed to train first so the rest would fall in line. Tom pointed to Charlie, the team captain, but Master Tom seemed to dismiss him--yes, yes, obviously the captain, but who else? Well, Buzz considered, the role of coach seeming somehow both familiar and foreign now, returning senior Eadric probably, and sophomore Diego was a good swimmer who always seemed to be an instigator whenever mischief was involved ...

Master Tom made small notes as Buzz talked about each swimmer's personality. The other man seemed pleased, and Buzz felt happy to be pleasing him. Master Tom pulled the folder away, closed it. He put something else on the table. A pair of running shoes and a pair of shorts. Buzz looked up at him in question. "Get dressed," the man said. "Your yard needs mowing."

Ten minutes later, as he knelt over the lawn mower in the garage and filled the fuel tank, Buzz realized this was a test. He could just walk to the neighbors' house, ask to use their phone, call the police, and report what had happened to him. But, somehow, he didn't want to. Loyalty? Conditioning? No, he simply didn't want to do anything except what he'd been told. Whatever Master Tom had done to him, Buzz found he liked it, liked the way he felt under the influence of those coin-things--artifacts Master Tom called them--and he wanted to feel that way again soon. The spell they wove around him made him intensely horny, made him feel both muzzy-headed but also focused, as if someone else was doing his thinking for him and for once he knew exactly what do to, which was what Master Tom told him to do. And if Master Tom wanted to share this whatever-it-was with the rest of the team, Buzz thought, nodding, that sounded like a good idea. Fuck, those little assholes could use some training, needed more discipline, needed something that would distract them from chasing tail and drinking beer when they should be practicing and staying fit. Yeah, he thought Master Tom's interest in the team would work out for the best for all of them.

Buzz stood up, smoothed out the shorts he wore, and pulled the starter cord. The mower roared to life.

Mid-morning, not yet noon, so Buzz had been right about his captivity mirroring outside-world time. As he pushed the mower back and forth across the front lawn, waved to a passing neighbor, Buzz enjoyed the heat of the sunshine, the caress of a faint breeze, on his bare chest and legs. He wanted to do a good job on the lawn, wanted to please Master Tom, wanted Master Tom to reward him by sending him again to that so-horny place in his mind where nothing mattered except getting off. Buzz's cock was half-hard just from thinking about it.

Buzz sweated through the front yard, the back yard too. Task completed, he put the mower away, closed the garage. As he entered the house through the garage door, he thought he heard something from the basement. Muffled sounds.

Master Tom appeared at the head of the basement stairs. "Come with me."

Buzz followed him downstairs--only instead of turning one way into the makeshift bedroom where Buzz had spent the last four weeks, Master Tom turned the other way, toward the other unfinished basement room.

Buzz expected the room to be empty, and it was, except for plastic tarp, a single kitchen chair in the middle of it. In that chair sat a body: male, young, athletic, T-shirt, jeans, expensive-looking trainers, a hood over his head. From the way the man was sitting with his arms pulled back behind the chair, Buzz suspected restraints--perhaps that pair of handcuffs from his nightstand, the ones his ex-wife, that bitch, had liked to play with sometimes? The slouched posture and head half-rolled to one side suggested he was unconscious, asleep, or--

And the stench! Awful! Some mix of piss and shit? Buzz couldn't help recoiling from it.

Master Tom stood behind the seated youth. "You had a visitor yesterday." He pulled off the hood with a slow flourish.

Charlie? Yeah, he'd let his hair grow out over the summer, and a ball-gag distorted his mouth, but that was definitely Charlie, the captain of the swim team. He looked dazed, as if drunk or drugged. Had Master Tom drugged him? Or had those disk-things done this to him? Was that what Buzz himself looked like when the disks pulled him down hard into one of those memory-less voids?

"He came to your door," Master Tom was saying, "yesterday morning. Said he wanted to hang out with you, catch up after the summer. You were in the middle of one your training sessions, of course, and I was not going to interrupt that. But I thought: Why not get a head-start on him? He's captain of the swim team, so he's got to be one of the first we bring in anyway. Think of how much smoother the process will go with both you and Charlie leading the others? So trusting--I invited him in, told him you were in the basement, and he followed me down here like a lamb before I introduced him to one of the artifacts. Sadly, I wasn't prepared for him to drop into our hands ahead of schedule, and I didn't have time to rig up a second training room. I had to improvise."

"Is he okay?"

"Oh, yes. The first exposure to the artifacts seems to have hit him harder than most. Instead of a trance, it induced a near-comatose state; he lost control of his muscles, including his bladder and sphincter, and soiled himself. He'll get acclimated to the effect over time, like you did, but he'll need time. For now, I want you to take him into your training room and get him cleaned up, get him in bed for the next step." Master Tom turned to walk away, and over his shoulder: "I left some things in your sink; you'll know what to do with them, I'm sure."

Buzz thought about it. Clean Charlie up? Sure, he could do that. Wasn't that one of the rules?--Serve the swim team. He'd done that sort of thing now and then when one or another of his swimmers had gotten drunk and called him, or the bar they'd overdone it in called him. He'd gone and picked them up, no questions asked, no judgment, gotten them cleaned up, bedded them down on his living room couch, more like a big brother than a father figure. He'd even done it for Charlie himself last year, twice, when the swimmer went through a brief party-boy phase after the breakup of some kid-intense love affair or other. The second time Charlie had drunkenly hinted he wanted more than to just sleep off the alcohol on Buzz's couch, hinted he wanted to join Buzz in his bed for a night of what Charlie called fun--Well, secretly flattered at the interest, Buzz gently said no and told the swimmer he wasn't into guys. Which he wasn't, not really. And anyway, Charlie was in the process of passing out right then, so the possibility of fun was gone anyway. The couch worked just fine after all.

He could do this for Charlie again. "Let's get you on your feet, champ," Buzz said to the semi-conscious youth, lifting his torso off the chair. As he suspected, Charlie's wrists were handcuffed behind him. Master Tom was taking no chances, Buzz decided. But handcuffed wrists made the task of lifting the youth trickier. Buzz wouldn't be able to get Charlie's arm across his shoulder. Okay, a fireman's carry would have to do. Buzz bent and pressed his shoulder to Charlie's abdomen, letting the younger man's body drape over his shoulders. Then Buzz stood, hoisting the unresisting body aloft. Awkward, but do-able. Angling carefully through the door frame, he headed for his training room.

In the bathroom that he had come to know so well. Buzz managed to put Charlie's feet on the floor, eased the body off his shoulders, and sat him on the closed toilet seat. Master Tom had said something about the sink: in it, Buzz's battery-powered shaving clippers with a number-two guard, and a pair of scissors. The scissors he couldn't understand, but the clippers seemed obvious: Charlie's summer-shaggy hair had to go.

Buzz flicked on the clippers. The loud rzzz told him the battery was fully charged and ready. Buzz glanced at himself in the mirror. His own hair had been clipped recently too. He didn't remember that--didn't know whether Master Tom did it or ordered him to do it to himself like he usually did. He didn't remember, didn't need to remember. He had a job to do and he needed to do that instead.

Buzz bent Charlie's loose-rolling head forward; he pressed the droning clippers to the back of the swim captain's neck, drew them up along the scalp, moving the ball-gag strap aside when the clippers needed to pass. The clippers bit into the hair; chunks fell away, leaving a quarter-inch layer of hair behind. Rzzz-rzzz-rzzz, and then he tilted Charlie's head to one side. Rzzz-rzzz-rzzz, and most of area around one ear was stubble now.

"Nnn-uh?" Charlie jerked his head, seemed to be rousing from his stupor.

Buzz held Charlie's skull steady with one hand, murmured, "It's okay, champ. I got you. Hold still."

Maybe Charlie was aware enough to recognize his coach's voice, to trust him, because he stopped trying to move.

The clippers growled on, and Charlie's hair fell away. In moments Buzz had the swimmer's scalp decimated to a quarter-inch everywhere. He stepped back, put the deactivated clippers into the sink, and surveyed his handiwork. Looked good.

But he still had more to do. Charlie still needed to be cleaned up, and that meant his soiled clothes had to go. The T-shirt would be a challenge; Charlie's arms were handcuffed behind him, and Master Tom had left no key.

Maybe the scissors? Master Tom must have left them here for a reason--this reason.

Buzz snipped at the neckline of the T-shirt, a two-inch cut. He gripped each side of the cut and tugged. Shriiip! The fabric tore to the waist. A series of snips from the armhole to the frontal rip, then repeated for the other arm, and the T-shirt came away from Charlie's torso.

Buzz knelt and pulled off the youth's right shoe and sock, then repeated for the left ones. The piss-soaked and shit-burdened jeans and underwear would be tricky. Best to load him into the shower stall first--control the mess. "Let's get you up," Buzz said, pushing Charlie's torso upright. Hands under the younger man's arms, Buzz lifted him to standing. He staggered the young jock over and into the shower. Cleanup would be easier there.

Buzz propped Charlie against the back wall. Checked his jeans pockets; no wallet, keys, or phone--Master Tom must have already taken them. Buzz wasn't looking forward to pulling those messed pants down. He needed to do this quickly. So, the scissors to the rescue. Kneeling, starting at the ankle, Buzz cut his way up the outside of Charlie's jeans, taking care not to nick the skin underneath. He reached the hip, made sure to cut through the briefs too. With his hands on Charlie's hips, Buzz turned his body so that he could get to Charlie's other leg and cut his way up. Yuck! The piss- and shit-soiled jeans and underwear came away between Charlie's legs in one bundle that Buzz pushed to the far corner of the shower floor. He'd deal with the wreckage later.

Okay. Water on. The spray was cold at first, and Charlie mumbled an incoherent protest of shock around the gag: "Nurph!" His head seemed to clear. He tugged at the handcuffs, chewed at the ball-gag. "Rmmph!"

"Be still," Buzz coaxed as he fingered the ball-gag clasp at the back of Charlie's skull.

Charlie seemed to calm down, barely coherent but recognizing his coach.

Should he? Probably not, but Buzz opened the gag clasp anyway, pulled away the strap, popped the ball out of Charlie's mouth.

"Co'sh," slurred Charlie, the closest he could get to saying Coach.

By now the water had begun to warm quickly. Buzz patted the jock's shoulder. "It's okay, champ. Let's get you cleaned up." Buzz eased the swimmer under the spray and reached past him for the soap. The water smashing over Charlie's abdomen and crotch and down his legs would take care of the piss. Coach started running the soap over Charlie's shoulders and back. He turned the swimmer, and the water struck Charlie's buttocks, blasting free shards of caked shit and liquifying some of it into a brown slurry that ran down the jock's legs and into the drain. Disgusting, Buzz thought, but he needed to do it--Master Tom had told him to do it, and Charlie needed him to do it. Serve the team.

Buzz soaped his hands, rubbed them over Charlie's buttocks, clearing away the brown smears. The younger athlete's ass cheeks were rounded, solid as granite covered by warm skin. Buzz sent the blade of his hand into Charlie's crack, pushing away bits of shit, smearing the suds in deeply. His fingers brushed Charlie's hole--and Charlie pushed his ass back against the hand, as if wanting those fingers inside him. Buzz remembered that time Charlie'd been drunk and hinted he wanted to share Buzz's bed, sexually, offered his body to him. Hmm. Buzz tried a little penetration, one soaped finger pushing past the snug opening, going one knuckle in, two. Charlie moaned. Somehow, that seemed very hot, and Buzz felt his cock stiffening in his shower-soaked shorts. Charlie's head rolled on his shoulder toward Buzz's, mouth barely parted and dangerously close to Buzz's. Somehow they kissed, briefly, clumsily, because Charlie was maybe halfway conscious--but Buzz was suddenly aware of how long his sexual dry spell had been since the divorce, how much he missed intimate touches. Jacking off had gotten him by, but now he felt something awaken in him and in his shorts, his balls tingling, cock stiffening a little. He wasn't gay, not really, but he very much wanted to see where this led.

Charlie pulled away, an awkward lurch, and turned his back. Buzz wondered what he had done wrong, and then he smelled the urine and saw the yellow swirling into the drain. Charlie's bladder must have been full again; he was pissing against the far wall, and the swimmer blushed with humiliation when, over his shoulder, he saw Buzz watching him. "It's okay, champ," Buzz assured him. "Do what you gotta do."

Charlie turned part of the way back to indicate he was finished. Buzz quickly soaped the jock's swim-muscled legs, just enough to clean away any lingering piss or shit, noting that the youth's cock was maybe half-erect. He shut off the water. He'd deal with the wreckage of Charlie's clothes later, after ... What? Well, after whatever came next, of course.

Buzz pulled the towel, still a bit damp from his own earlier shower, and began to rub it briskly over the swimmer's body. The kid's cock, when he got to it, was fully hard now, and Buzz found Charlie was looking at him unreadably. Buzz had seen hard cocks before, in locker rooms and a three-way once with his college roommate and a girl, and had even seen them spit cum during high school circle-jerks. Charlie's ... Buzz had a sudden wonder of what it would taste like, feel like in his ass ... Wasn't that one of the Three Rules ... I serve the ... What would it taste like ... If he leaned forward just a little, opened his ...

Holy fuck, Buzz scolded himself, pulling back. What had he been about to do?

Buzz stood quickly. "Okay, champ, let's ..." What? What should he do next? Master Tom had said to get him cleaned up, get him in bed for the next step. Okay. "Let's get you to the bed."

One arm around Charlie's torso to steady him, Buzz guided the younger man into the bedroom, toward the bed. Charlie fell into it heavily, since his arms were still cuffed behind his back, and face-down. Charlie moved his legs, maneuvering himself: shoulders down, ass raised up, knees apart. A position of submission and sexual receptiveness.

Buzz sat on the edge of the bed. Those ass cheeks seemed perfect. Buzz wasn't gay, though maybe he wasn't as straight as he thought, and he needed to see where this went. He ran a hand over that ass, a finger into the slot, feeling the lingering shower-moisture as he flicked his fingertip back and forth over the puckered hole. Charlie moaned, reminding Buzz the ass was attached to someone. "You want it?" Buzz asked, and Charlie half-nodded, moaned again, a pleading sound. Okay, consent was given.

With quick efficiency Buzz kicked off his shoes, dropped his damp shorts and underwear. He climbed onto the bed, between Charlie's knees. The younger swimmer pushed his butt slightly toward Buzz again, and the coach stared at it. Buzz's cock was hard. How something like a cock could fit into a hole that small seemed to defy physics, but Buzz needed to make it happen. How? Lube would probably help. He skuttled off the bed. From the cardboard box by the bed, Buzz retrieved the bottle of lubricant and returned to the space between Charlie's legs. His cock seemed to be homing in on that hole, and Buzz slathered his cock with a heavy coating of the slick liquid.

One hand on Charlie's hip, the other steadying his cock-shaft, Buzz pushed forward. The ass-ring resisted, then seemed to relax, give way, and open itself as Buzz's glans slid inside. An inch of shaft, then two inches more. Holy fuck, Buzz thought, awed by the furnace-heat and tightness of being surrounded by Charlie's ass.

Buzz's hips started to pump. Short strokes at first, getting used to the squeeze, so different from a loose pussy, and then longer strokes. Beneath him, Charlie moaned, so Buzz knew he was doing something right.

Buzz felt as if he was being swept up in something, some new step being taken ... The Three Rules ... I serve ... What? Master Tom? Master Tom hadn't told him to do this. No--the team ...

I serve the team ...

Yes, so obvious now, everything clicking into place. Moaning Charlie was horny, needed to be fucked, so Buzz needed to do that for him. His strokes took on confidence. He wasn't gay; he was serving the team. Charlie pushed his ass back somehow to meet Buzz's pumps.

Buzz felt something, a familiar spaciness, a feeling of floating outside his body. He glanced to the door. Sure enough, two of those round things were open and shining, a slow spin, spreading their spell into the room. Charlie made a sound, and his expression seemed out of it, lost in the effect and maybe already unconscious. Buzz could hold out a little, let the effect pass through him without submerging him, at least for a little while. But he knew he wouldn't be able to hold out for long.

"Relax. Focus on my voice." Master Tom's voice from the bedside smart speaker. "Deep trance. Deeper. Like sleep. Deep sleep. Deep trance."

Charlie's body was slack, and only Buzz's grip held him up. The younger man was completely gone--asleep, deep trance, like Master Tom said. Buzz wondered distantly how long until the same thing happened to him. Everything already felt so far away and inevitable, out of his control.

"Obey. Focus on my voice. Deep trance. Deeper. Obey."

Buzz felt himself slipping. How long? Not long now.

"Make him cum." Master Tom's voice again. "His training will lock in deeper after he cums."

Okay, Buzz had his orders. He pumped that unresisting ass with vigor. Under the distancing influence of the effect, taking action was easier now that he had been told to do something. He reached underneath and stroked Charlie's still-hard cock. Less than a minute later, Buzz felt a sudden wetness coat his fingers: Charlie had cum. Buzz felt oddly triumphant, knowing he'd made the younger man shoot. Buzz held up his messy hand for the surveillance cameras to see.

"Good boy. Now, finish fucking him. You want to cum too."

Now Buzz could focus on his own pleasure. His hips pumped fast and deep. He felt the artifact effect intensify--a glance at the door--another of them was open now, and swirling slowly.

"Cum and focus. Cum and obey. Cum and deep trance."

Would the training lock in deeper in himself too once he'd cum too? Obviously. He pushed the question aside--he'd cum a lot under the influence over the last four weeks, so what was one more? Too late anyway. Buzz was too close--his balls--his cock--

"Cum and deep sleep. Cum now. Sleep now. Deep trance now."

Now flipped him past some point of no return. Buzz was cumming, cumming in Charlie's ass, cumming, body tensed, then going limp on top of Charlie, as the world faded, darkness covering his senses. Buzz felt himself sinking down to the bed, down into the effect, and down into ...

7. Berto and Charlie: Now, Late Summer

Berto didn't remember much about the long hike. Must have been the heat--it fucked with a guy's head sometimes.

Where had the summer gone? Seemed like practically yesterday Diego had come home after his semester ended, and now the whole summer was almost gone. Soon they'd have to leave for college. Diego and Curt were returning as juniors; Berto and Trace would be entering as freshmen. Berto couldn't wait. He'd wanted to skip the camping trip entirely, wanted to go directly to college, get moved in, and hang out a while before classes started, but he supposed Diego was right: Wasn't much point in hanging out on campus if no one else was there. He'd just have to be patient.

Diego and Curt did most of the planning; Berto and his friend Trace were happy to let them. Their brothers had scheduled the trip for just before they had to leave for college. One last week of spending time together, just the four of them; one last week of freedom before classes and classwork, team practices and meets, and of course what Berto was really wanting to experience: all the parties, social stuff, and sex that college had to offer.

They'd been coming to this spot in the mountains for a few years now. It was practically their special place. Berto didn't remember much about the hike itself, but he didn't need to; remembering wasn't important. He'd started in a T-shirt, shorts, hiking boots, shouldering a backpack, and somewhere along the way he'd taken off his shirt--so had the other three. Diego and Curt had even stripped off their shorts and marched along in just their team underwear and their hikers, as if not caring whether anyone saw their asses hanging out of the backless briefs! Fortunately no one ever seemed to come this way and they hadn't passed anyone else the whole hike--at least not the parts Berto could remember. The trek, alternating through the hot sun then the cool forest shadows, passed in a mental fog, like a dream or something. Yeah, must've been the heat.

And horny!--Berto was always so fucking horny these days. He hoped no one would see the boner he'd been packing in his shorts on and off the whole way. He knew he'd be able to--would need to--find some time to sneak away for some self-loving, once they set up camp. Yeah, a jack-off was required, or he'd go crazy! He just needed to keep his mind off how horny he was, at least for another hour or so.

Berto had also thought just the four of them would be on this trip, but when they reached their usual campsite, a tent already stood there, and Diego and Curt greeted the guy with smiles and slaps on the back, and they introduced him to Berto and Trace as Charlie, a senior now and captain of the team. Well, okay. Berto decided everything made sense: Of course Diego and Curt would have told their teammates about this spot, probably camped here with them before--teammates shared everything, right?--even special camping spots. And Charlie being here made sense too; this would be a good chance to get to know someone else on their team, since they'd be teammates really soon. A couple of months ago, Berto might have been jealous at sharing his brother-time with someone else, might have resented Charlie as an intruder, but his presence seemed natural. Already Charlie seemed to sort-of belong there with them, like a puzzle piece that was definitely part of the picture but just hadn't quite been fitted into its place until now.

Aside from a necklace, Charlie wore only a pair of team underwear that matched his brother Diego's--practically naked!--so Berto knew he must be an okay guy. But it was that necklace Berto noticed. It looked like that good-luck coin thing Diego had, only suspended on a cord so that it rested in the center of Charlie's chest. Was having a good-luck piece like that a team thing too?

By the time they finished setting up their tents, securing their food, and getting the fire pit dug, Berto was almost cross-eyed with horniness. He'd been a lot hornier than usual all summer, and now his balls had worked him practically into a frenzy. Sneaking off for a jack-off release was even more urgent--he needed to stroke out a load soon, before his fucking testicles exploded like little cum-grenades!

Over the course of the summer, Berto had relaxed about quite a few things. He'd gotten used to being in his underwear or naked with Diego; and if Diego told him to strip down all the way, he did so right away, no longer bothered at all. And if he got a hard-on? Hard-ons were natural when a guy got naked, right? Natural, though they still embarrassed him a bit, and showing off a hard cock still seemed a little wrong. Diego's torso, his ass--he had the kind of body Berto wanted, swimmer-tight but with a little more manly muscle, trim but not kid-skinny, and Diego never seemed to wear a shirt unless he had to.

Over the summer, Berto had started emulating that, and now he was shirtless just as often as Diego. Berto hadn't thought much about guys sexually before this summer, but now he was fascinated by how sexy Diego and Curt were, Trace too. At first Berto had started having those weird almost-dreams, almost-memories of going to a quiet place in his head where the sexy turned sexual, but he thought those couldn't be real, could they, just products of his overheated libido. Then came the day he was hanging out with Trace in that abandoned gas station, and of course Trace tried to talk Berto into jacking off with him. And this time Berto had surprised himself by saying okay. He needed to get off, and the horniness was overpowering, and his need for release overruled his shyness. Berto had been surprised by how hard he got when he stripped down all the way with Trace, like peeling off their clothes all those times in the locker rooms at swim practice but completely different since they were about to masturbate. And he was surprised by how, just as Berto was about to cum, Trace had pushed his hand away and gone down on Berto's cock, swallowing the big thing with ease. And Berto was surprised by how agreeably he let Trace suck him, and how quickly he came, and how strong his orgasm had been--holy fuck, so very strong!

They never talked about what was happening to them, except after that first time.

"Have you sucked cock before?" Berto asked as Trace wiped some stray cum off his mouth, because Berto was thinking no way was that Trace's first time--he'd sucked too damn good.

Trace shrugged. "Aside from swapping hand-jobs, I never tried anything like this with another guy until Curt blew me a week ago in our bedroom. Now it's like I can't get enough cock. I get horny every time I see Curt, like uncontrollably horny ... and, uh, I even let your brother Diego fuck me yesterday. It's no big deal, right? Just a teammate thing, helping out our teammates."

Trace and Curt?--And Diego too? A teammate thing? Berto couldn't process all that immediately, but something seemed oddly right about what Trace had said. "I've been having weird dreams about doing shit with Diego," Berto admitted quietly. "Sexual shit. I think I might have actually done some of those sexual things with him, too."

"You think? You're not sure? If you had, you'd know it, right?"

Berto shook his head. "I dunno. Sometimes the dreams are so vivid I can't tell what's a dream and what's real life."

Trace nodded. "It was the same with me, at first. Then I got so tired of just dreaming about it and decided to do it. And you know what?--Doin' it for real's real good, once you get used to it."

And then they didn't have to talk anymore because Trace dropped his knees, face level with Berto's groin, and Trace opened his mouth and began to suck again, and after a nervous moment Berto relaxed and let him and came again.

After that day, Berto realized what a fearless horn-dog Trace was becoming for guy-on-guy stuff. Their daily jack-offs together always turned into Trace blowing him. And just a week later, they'd been in Trace's bedroom, and Trace was blowing Berto, and Trace's brother Curt walked in. Berto remembered starting to freak out, but Curt hadn't said a word; he'd just grinned and pushed down his team underwear, and Trace had practically jumped on Curt's hard-on and blown him while Berto stared. That was the day Berto tasted his first cock, something he'd had dreams about doing with Diego, but now there he was kneeling and sucking his buddy Trace while Trace blew Curt's cock. Berto found he didn't mind sucking--in fact he kind of liked reciprocating. Then he co-sucked Curt's dick alongside Trace, and Trace and Curt tag-team sucked Berto's. Yeah, he'd thought, teammates serving teammates felt so damn special-good!

How easily he took to sucking cock had Berto suspecting those dreams with Diego hadn't been just dreams after all. And later that night, alone in their bedroom, when Diego told Berto to strip down, Berto did as he was told. They'd gotten erections, and Berto finally worked up the nerve to kneel and blow his brother--and Diego had let him! And done the same thing to him too! And they'd done it again the next morning and lots of times after that. Berto still felt weird every time, but he enjoyed the sex and being with Diego--and Trace and Curt--and Berto was feeling less weird every time. Trace was right; doing it really was fun, and a lot better than just dreaming about it. Berto wasn't ready to go full horn-dog like Trace, but part of him had been hoping this week turned into nonstop sexual fun, teammates serving teammates, and another part of him had been fearing it, afraid of liking it too much, a point of no return.

But now how would their dynamic be altered by this new guy Charlie? Diego and Curt said he was captain of the swim team, and he'd stripped to his team underwear just like Diego and Curt, and even Trace who seemed to be eager to copy everything Curt did. So Charlie was probably cool. But Berto was always a little wary around people he didn't know well. For now he was keeping his shorts on.

By the time they finished their setup work, they were slick with sweat and their torsos gleamed in the hot sun. That's when somebody yelled, "Skinny-dipping time!" and they all ran to the creek about seventy meters through the forest from their clearing. Diego and Trace were stripping off their hiking boots and underwear as Charlie and Curt, already naked, were leaping into the water. Damn, Berto wished everyone had gone slower, so he could've gotten a better look at their bodies, but then he was too busy tugging off his own hikers, shorts and underwear. He needed to get into the water before anyone saw his half-wood. Maybe the water would give his dick a chance to calm down.

Berto jumped in on top of them. Charlie and Diego wrestled while Curt and Trace splashed them in the chest-deep, slow-moving stream. They looked so sexy with rivulets of water flowing down over their hard, muscular chests. Berto's mind exploded with fantasies of wild guy-on-guy sex. Yikes! Where were these ideas coming from? And why did they seem so much like memories? He really needed to jack off. How could he manage to control himself?

They must have played around in the water, wet bodies sliding over each other like otters, for close to an hour. Almost the whole time, Berto's rebellious cock kept trying to stay full-hard no matter how he thought of un-sexy things. By the time Diego hauled himself, gloriously naked, onto the shore and shook the water vigorously from his hair and torso like a dog, making his cock and balls swing back and forth, Berto had given up the fight and resigned himself that his cock was going to be granite-hard for a while. Fuck, he needed to stroke off a load! Maybe he could jack off under the water without anyone noticing? Or maybe he could pull Trace into the trees and get a slutty suck-job from him; hell, Berto might even reciprocate. Yeah, would definitely reciprocate.

Diego announced, "We better head back to camp, guys," and everybody else replied with exaggerated disappointment: Awww ... Curt and Trace climbed out of the water too and went about finding their hiking boots and underwear. So much for taking Trace into the bushes for some relief. "You coming, Berto?" Diego asked him.

"Uh ..." No! No way Berto was getting out of the water with an erection! They'd all see and laugh. Seeing his hard-on during one-on-one sex stuff for relief was no big deal--teammates getting relief; but parading around bare-assed with a hard-on that everyone could see? No way! Too embarrassing. "Uh, I'm gonna swim a few more minutes. You go ahead. I'll be there soon."

Diego shook his head. "I don't want you staying down here all alone."

"I'll stay with him," a lazy drawl from beside Berto announced and--dammit!--he'd forgotten about Charlie. Well, so much for getting some privacy to jerk off alone. "If that's okay," the captain grinned, though Berto wasn't sure whether Charlie was talking to him or to Diego.

Diego started with a frown. "But--"

"It's fine. We won't be long," Charlie assured him, his voice firm, a quick splash of water in Diego's general direction.

"Okay, fine," huffed Diego, and he joined Curt and Trace in disappearing into the forest.

"Got yourself a hard-on, huh?" Charlie said, matter-of-factly, once he and Berto were alone.

Berto blushed, appalled. "Uh, yeah, kind of."

Charlie snickered. "Figured. It's okay. Happens to every guy. No big deal." He swam toward the water's edge. "Bet you were planning to jack off, weren't you?"

Fuck, could he get any more humiliated? "Yeah," Berto admitted.

Charlie strode out of the water, and Berto tried not to stare at his ass, his chest, the round disk pendant hanging in the center of it, his abs, his free-swinging cock that seemed a little more than soft. "There'll be time for jacking-off later. But Diego's right--come on--we should head back. I bet once we get to camp, everything'll be under control. You'll see."

Berto sighed. Well, okay, nothing left to do but do this. He pushed himself toward the shore, letting the water fall away from him.

Charlie appraised Berto's rod, not even trying to hide where he was looking, and the older swimmer nodded a brief approval. "Nice. With a dick like that, you're gonna be real popular. It's as big as your brother's, am I right?"

What? "You've seen Diego hard?"

"Sure--we all have. Everybody on the swim team has seen everybody else hard-up. No big deal. That's one of the Rules.

Okay, that made sense. Guys naked in locker rooms or showers always were at risk of an accidental boner, and hadn't Diego said sometimes the team members jacked off together after practice? But Charlie's tone seemed to imply more than just a quick, utilitarian jerk-job, especially when he added, "And I'm looking forward to seeing that big piece of yours in action."

Whoa! Was that a come-on? Berto was mulling what that might mean when he realized something: "Assholes! They took my clothes!"

Charlie snickered. "So? They took mine too. You gonna be a baby and hide out in the woods all night? Or are you going to sack yourself up and follow me back to camp so we can show them they can't buffalo us that easily?"

Sigh. Nothing to do but to do it.

The walk didn't take long. Just short of the camp, though, Berto announced, "You go ahead. I gotta piss." He sidled over to a tree just off the rail and aimed his half-hard cock.

"Dude"--Charlie shook his head--"you just got out of the water. Why didn't you piss there?"

"No way. Too much like pissing in the pool. I'm not gonna do that! Uh ... Are you going to give me some privacy, or what?"

Charlie walked on. Ah, sweet privacy! Berto gave his cock a rub and it responded with rapid swelling. He started stroking, didn't wait for it to get fully hard. One hand fist-pumped it hard and fast, just the way that always got him off the quickest. So fucking horny! His other hand scratched under his ball-sack, making his asshole twitch like an odd hunger. That did it. "Ahh!" Berto croaked as quietly as he could, as he came and spurted his load at the tree trunk.

Just over a minute, probably, from start to finish. Quick but satisfying--took the edge off his horniness. Now maybe he could get through the evening his damn hormones driving him out of his mind.

He wiped his hand and cock-head clean with leaves; the rough texture felt weird on his sensitive post-cum glans, but no way was Berto showing up at camp with spunk dripping from his cock. He considered running back to the creek to clean off in the water--no, he'd already been gone too long. The last thing he needed was for those clothes-stealing assholes to decide he was lost and come looking for him. He'd much rather get teased about Remember when we stole your clothes and made you walk back naked than Remember that time you got lost and we had to come looking for you. They'd give him shit about it mercilessly for the rest of the trip!

About fifteen yards from the camp, everything clearly visibly, Berto froze and ducked behind a bush and tree combination that would hide him from their sight. Who the heck were these other guys?

In the camp up ahead from where he squatted, he could see an older, thirtyish man--was that Coach Thompson from the college swim team?--what was he doing here?--and another guy standing near him, and two other dudes about Berto's age. Diego and Curt and Trace were there too, so they all seemed to know each other. But who were they, and what was going on? And what was that faint static in the air that made Berto's cock and balls tingle again, as if he hadn't just cum?

The thirtyish man was bare-chested; he wore a pair of those ass-less team briefs that Diego and Curt always wore; yeah, made sense if he was Coach Thompson. The two unknown younger guys stood near, talking distance; one of them wore just a pair of the backless team briefs, so he was a team member too, maybe, while the other wore shorts and hiking shoes. Diego and Curt, with Trace between them, were standing back, as if waiting their turn, but at what? Their backs were mostly toward Berto, so no way did they know he was spying on them. All three of them were naked and prick-proud--well, of course they were--and they didn't seem embarrassed at all.

But the two unknown guys about Berto's age seemed to be the focus. They stood in front of the thirtyish man and the other man--like one of the unknown young guys was presenting the other to them? The older man said something, and then the younger guy being presented said something, though Berto couldn't make out the words. But the way the guy acted seemed off, swaying a bit, as if an unknown force was making him feel drunk or stoned. Somehow Berto could kind of feel it too, just a little from so far away, and the weird but familiar feeling seemed to be going directly to his cock and balls, making him horny as fuck, even though he had just squirted a load only a few minutes ago.

"See something you like?"

Berto jumped at the abrupt whisper behind him, so close to his ear. He wrenched his head to look over his shoulder, found Charlie crouched behind him, and he quiet-hissed, "Dude! What the fuck!"

Charlie just grinned, toying with that good-luck disk pendant at his chest. "Sorry to spook you." He nodded back to toward the camp. "Look what's happening now."

Berto looked back. "Who are those guys?"

"Well, that's Coach Thompson. You know him, right?"

"Yeah." Berto had met him very briefly, a couple of times, when he'd gone to attend some of Diego's swim meets. Now that Charlie had said his name, who that man was seemed a lot more concrete.

"And the guy on the other side of him is Master Tom--"

Master Tom? Had Berto heard correctly? What kind of name was that? Why did it seem familiar, like a placeholder he'd been waiting to plug someone into?

"The guy taking his clothes off is Blake. He's an incoming freshman--fresh meat for the swim team, like you. And that's Eadric next to him; he's a senior, been on the team a couple of years now."

The young guy being presented, Blake, stopped talking and started stripping. What in hell? Berto thought as his jaw dropped open in surprise. Eadric slipped off his team underwear and slow-tossed them aside. He had an average-long, bobbing boner; Blake did too. Holy fuck! Eadric led Blake aside.

"I guess you can't see it real well from way over here," Charlie said.

"See what?"

Charlie didn't elaborate.

And Diego and Curt looked proud as shit as they led Trace forward, to the place before Coach and Master Tom where Blake had stood moments before.

Charlie snickered. "According to Curt, your pal Trace is a real horny fucker, maybe even hornier than Diego and me put together, if that's possible." Then, "Hey," Charlie said, quieter, and Berto felt Charlie's hand pat his shoulder, felt--

A quiet, distracted feeling rolled through Berto. A bleary feeling, like that time he stayed up all night studying for his history exam and was too tired to stay all the way awake the next day. He felt far away from his body, and he felt his cock hardening. His head turned, sluggish on his neck, and he saw the pendant Charlie wore had begun to open, a soft green and white glow, motes of light rotating. Berto knew this feeling somehow.

"C'mon, stand up," Charlie said. Another pat on Berto's shoulder. "You don't want to miss your friend being introduced to Master Tom, do you? Diego and Curt are gonna show us how good they've got him trained."

Berto's body drifted to his feet. Charlie's arm around Berto's shoulders guided him forward, toward the camp.

Charlie guided him past ... Eadric lay on his back on a sleeping bag near the extinguished fire pit. He held his lube-shiny cock pointed upward. Blake straddled and squatted over him, ass descending toward that erection, about impale himself.

Closer now, Berto could see it. Coach held something in his palm that glowed and moved like Charlie's pendant-disk, only in motes of a different color, and he was saying something about rules to Trace as Berto was guided closer. Trace sounded super-stoned; he was answering Coach, something about "Serve th' team ... Serve th' artifacts ..."

"Good," Coach said. "Are you ready to show me how well you serve the team?"

"Yuhsuhr."

"Diego, Curt, show us how well you've trained him."

Berto watched as his brother and Curt, grinning intently, pulled Trace to one side, pulled him down onto another sleeping bag. And over there, Blake was squatting himself up and down over Eadric's crotch, fucking himself on the older swimmer's dick. And back to Trace, who was leaning for Diego's cock like he was about to suck it--

Charlie was guiding Berto forward, saying something: "--brother's busy, so I'll do the honors. Coach, Master Tom, this is Berto."

"Hello, Berto."

Berto steered his head forward. That thing in Coach's hand in front of him, the one on Charlie's chest behind him--Berto felt as though he was floating, drifting, suspended between them.

"I found him spying on us," Charlie said from behind Berto. "He'd snuck away to jerk off."

"Horny as your brother, huh?" Coach half-chuckled. "Do you know who I am?"

"Coasssh ..."

"Good. And this is Master Tom. You know that name, don't you."

"Yuh ..." Berto looked at the man, Master Tom, and something fit into that placeholder now.

"And I bet you know the Three Rules, don't you. What are they?"

Berto thought about this. He knew the answer. How didn't matter. He just knew. "I zehrve Massuh Tawm ..." His tongue was too thick and muddy to make the words right, but Coach and Master Tom didn't seem to mind. "Sss-serve tha team ... I shurve art'facts ..."

"Very good, Berto. All right, Charlie--get him ready."

Charlie led Berto to another unrolled sleeping bag, urged him down onto it. "Looks like I'm gonna get my wish about seeing your piece in action. You're gonna love this. I'm the best on the team at suckin' cock, no matter what Diego says."

Berto felt Charlie lick his cock. Charlie's cock was heading toward Berto's mouth too. Sixty-nine? Had Berto ever done that? He was pretty sure he'd never--but somehow this act seemed familiar too. One of those dreams, maybe? Sure, he could do this.

Charlie was saying, "Trust me--the training locks in a lot stronger after we get you ready. Now show me how well Diego's trained you to kiss a dick." Then Charlie shut up as his mouth began to swallow Berto's cock, and of course Berto opened his mouth as ordered to receive the head and first inch of Charlie's--Berto had to show how well Diego had trained him.

Coach said. "That's it. Serve the team."

Some small part of Berto couldn't believe that he was sucking a guy he barely knew, and so readily too, where everyone could see. The half-dreams, half-memories he had been having about Diego, Curt, and Trace--and the times he had stroked them, sucked them--those times were different. He knew those guys, and if he'd been having sex with them, that was because they were his friends. Serve the team. But he wasn't on the college team, not yet anyway, not until he actually got to college--

"That's it," Coach said. "Serve your teammate. Help relieve his balls. Welcome to the team, boys."

Welcome to ... So now he was--? Something else moved in his mind, his summer team and his college team starting to merge.

Berto caught sight of Trace around Charlie's hip. Trace, on his hands and knees, was enthusiastically sucking on kneeling Diego's cock while Curt licked Trace's asshole, obviously preparing to fuck his brother's butt. Trace grunted happily each time Diego's cock and Curt's tongue poked into him in unison. Then Berto felt Charlie's finger probe his own ass, and he refocused all of his attention on the cock in his mouth.

"Good, good," Coach was saying, from somewhere near and far away at the same time. "Breathe. Breathe deep. Slow down. Let everything happen at its own pace. Let everything slow down. Breathe deep. Let your teammates and the artifacts make you feel good. Don't fight it. Let everything happen in its own time. Relax. Enjoy. Focus. No distractions. Focus on my voice. Focus on how you feel, how the artifacts make you feel. Let that feeling take control."

Berto felt himself rolled over on his back. His legs were lifted high. His naked coach was settling between them, preparing to push his cock into Berto's ass. Berto turned his head and Master Tom's cock was right there, ready to be sucked, so Berto opened his mouth and started. Charlie knelt beside Berto, masturbating himself with one hand and Berto with the other, leisurely strokes, in no hurry.

"Relax." Coach seemed to be talking to him and to all of them. Berto felt the man's cock-head penetrate his sphincter, a jab of pressure and pain, and he gasped around Master Tom's mouth-filling prick. "Breathe deep," Coach instructed him, them. "Let the artifacts take you down in their own time. Let them take you down into a deep trance. It feels like being sleepy, like going to sleep, doesn't it. And when you're asleep, you'll be so open to the artifacts, ready to be part of the team, ready to be trained, ready to let your training lock in deeper and tighter than ever. Don't fight it. This is what you want, isn't it. What you crave. You need it to happen. Need to be part of the team. Like going to sleep. Deep sleep. Deep trance. Almost ready. Almost asleep. Let it happen. Almost in a deep trance, ready to lock in your training."

Something about this worried Berto. Sucking and fucking with Diego--Curt and Trace--his team. Just them. Not the college team members, not yet. But Coach had just said he was part of ... No, that placeholder wasn't ready to be filled. Berto wasn't fully ready for that last step, not yet. How should he break out of this effect and what he was feeling?

Coach fucked in rhythm as he spoke, punching little bursts of pleasure through Berto's nervous system. "Cum when you're ready. Sleep when you're ready. Cum and sleep. Deep sleep. Deep trance. Cum."

Berto heard someone nearby groan, and he swiveled his head. Blake was on his back, legs spread upright in the air, Eadric between them, fucking his ass. Blake groaned again, deep and guttural, eyes pressed shut. He was pawing at the sleeping bag underneath him with hands that seemed too clumsy to grip it, wasn't touching his cock. Berto saw his dick bounce, then saw it ejaculate--two, three ropes of cum across his chest. "Nnn," Blake moaned as his eyes closed and his body went still, seemed to relax profoundly.

That small part of Berto understood. Cumming would make them--him--relaxed and sleepy. Then they'd fall completely into the artifacts' effect, and whatever Coach and Master Tom told them--whatever so-called training changes they wanted to make--Coach and Master Tom could make those changes, make them think, want, do, anything--make them into anything--

Berto tried to pull his mouth off Master Tom's cock. He needed to warn Trace and Diego and Curt, tell them to stop fucking, to not cum, to not surrender, even though it felt so damn good--

But Master Tom's strong grasp wouldn't let go of his head, wouldn't let Berto spit out his cock. Nearby, Berto heard Eadric's voice, a gasp and a moan of pleasure as he climaxed, followed by a sigh.

Next to him, Charlie made a noise, and Berto felt droplets of body-hot sperm splatter across his stomach. Berto looked up. Charlie, eyes closed, swaying, looked like he was asleep where he knelt.

Trace groaned, which caught Berto's attention. That insatiable little horn-dog, on his back like Berto, getting fucked by Curt and sucking Diego, moaned happily again. Curt was fisting Trace's overheated cock. No, stop, Berto tried to warn them around the cock in his mouth, but what came out was "Nnn-mmph--"

"Part of the team," Coach was saying, and Berto felt his placeholder getting closer to a match, his objection starting to fade.

"Cum when you're ready," Coach recited. "Sleep when you're ready. Cum and sleep. Deep sleep. Deep trance. Cum for the team. Cum."

Berto saw Trace tense and shiver. His buddy's seed spurted up from his cock in Curt's fist. As Berto watched, Trace shuddered and rode through his orgasm--and after a few moments of tension, Trace's body slowly relaxed, sated for once, and his eyes went the rest of the way closed, so subtly Berto wasn't sure Trace even realized he was falling into a deep sleep. Falling into a trance, just like Coach said. Becoming part of the team.

Berto tried to move his arms, but that damn effect from the artifacts had them too heavy, too loose. Diego and Curt were moving over, both grinning dopily, nudging Charlie and his spent cock aside, standing over Berto. Diego and Curt had one arm across each other's shoulders, their other hands on their cocks, stroking, jacking off over him.

Watching them stroke their hard cocks--watching all of their naked bodies--watching them pleasure themselves--while the heavy pleasure filled him--while Coach fucked him--Coach's cock was tagging something inside Berto now--felt great--and Master Tom's cock in his mouth felt natural--

Part of the team--

"Proud of you, bro," Diego murmured. Diego, the handsome brother Berto had come to idolize even more this summer, like he'd previously hero-worshipped his high school coach--Diego seemed so happy, seemed to enjoy this so much. And even that resisting part of Berto admitted he'd loved spending so much time with his handsome brother this summer, feeling so close to him, a new depth of closeness with him, and with Curt and Trace too. If Diego was happy like this, maybe--

Part of the team--

First Diego, then Curt started to squirt their loads down on him.

Cum for the team. This felt so good. Felt like sliding--sliding away from who he was, into who he would be. Felt so fucking good. Maybe this wouldn't be so bad. He'd be a full part of the team anyway soon enough--with Diego--just like Diego. If Diego liked this, why was Berto fighting it? All he had to do was let it happen, let the team take care of him. It would be good--all of them together--all of them a team. Just like Diego had said. Just like Coach was saying between fuck-strokes. Whatever they would do to him, make him into, was for the team. They'd do it together. Diego--Coach--team--

Berto felt the placeholder click shut, his summer team and his college team were one now. Nothing mattered except the hard teammate cock in his mouth and the stiff teammate cock in his ass. Part of the team now--

Berto snapped back to what was happening to his body when Coach pushed a few hard and deep thrusts into his ass, a new angle, which shocked fresh bolts of pleasure through his butt. Coach dropped his head back, and a low sound escaped his throat as he pressed his cock in deep and came in Berto's ass, came hard.

A burst of cum in Berto's mouth--Master Tom's. Instead of Coach's silenced voice, now Master Tom was the one who droned, "Sleep when you're ready. Deep trance when you're ready. Don't fight it. Feels so good. Sleep so deep. Let it happen. Want it to happen. Whenever you're ready."

Master Tom's cock slid slowly from Berto's mouth. Berto felt a hand wrap around his supercharged cock. Whose hand? Didn't matter. He was serving the team; the team was serving him. Felt great. He was ready.

"Cum for us, Berto. Cum for the team."

Berto's body surrendered, and his orgasm broke out. A primal "Ahhh!" because everything felt so damn good! All of them a team. Berto felt himself soaring, soaring, flying through that masculine bliss that burned away every other care, soaring, cresting, then sliding back down into himself, down, one last deep breath, into heaviness, into the blankness of sleep.

8. Charlie and Adrian: Anything You Say

Adrian surfaced from his fantasy as he reached the end of his warm-up lap. The first college swim team practice of the year was about to start, and he knew he would soon impress the hell out of his new coach and the rest of the team.

He salmon-leaded from the pool, reached for his towel, feeling the satisfying glow of physical superiority that exertion always left in his shoulders and pectorals as he wiped the water from his face and chest. He ignored some of the team members who were gathering for practice and starting their stretching routines. They didn't have his dedication. He was too good, he knew, for this college, but it had a growing reputation, a good coaching staff, and it had offered the most scholarship money. Yeah, he was only an incoming freshman, new to the team, but college was just a formality on his way to the inevitable Olympic superstardom and the endorsement deals that would make him famous and wealthy. He wasn't here for the usual college horseshit, didn't care whether he was popular or his teammates liked him. Hell, he'd already turned down his coach's offer of a week-long camping trip with some of his teammates-to-be. A week in the middle of nowhere with a bunch of also-rans and no pool in sight? No way!--Not in his game plan. He was here to win, no matter what, and his determination did not allow for distractions like having fun or bonding with a bunch of team-bros. He wasn't state champ yet, let alone a contender for the Olympics, but this season he was sure he'd make a name for himself by winning every two-hundred-meter butterfly and four-hundred-meter relay he entered. Adrian saw himself as a team of one. This college was lucky to have him.

Adrian saw Coach Thompson. Buzz Thompson was making a name for himself in swimming circles. He had almost qualified as an Olympian himself. Of course, the finest athletes did not necessarily make good coaches. His greatness as a coach, of course, had yet to be proven, but Thompson's early successes over the last few years reflected well on him. He would be a good steppingstone on Adrian's path to the top echelon of competitive swimming and the Olympics.

Adrian went over to his new coach to shake his hand, say hello. Staying on the coach's good side was important if Adrian wanted to get the best training, the best opportunities. Of course, Adrian would jump to a better coach, a better school, as soon he had the chance, but Coach Thompson didn't need to know that. And when it happened, Thompson would have to admit whatever new stepping stone Adrian had lined up was too good to pass.

Aside from shaking his hand and saying hello, though, Adrian ignored the team captain at Thompson's side, Charlie something-or-whatever. Who over the age of twelve still went by a name like Charlie anyway? And what was with the way the captain looked at him, like he was hungry for something Adrian had to offer? Adrian was used to women looking at him that way. But a man? As if! Fucking another swimmer, a man with a body almost exactly like Adrian's own--wouldn't that be too much like fucking himself? Ew!

The team was gathering, and Adrian introduced himself to most of them as a formality. After all, he'd need to know their names to complain to Coach about them later. He remembered a few of the returning members by reputation from when he'd done his research on the college--this one had potential as a freestyler, that one had done well last year on the medley-relay squad. The team had some good athletic ability. He was also aware they needed to improve in order to reach Adrian's rarefied level of performance. But that was fine for Adrian; he might even step into the role of teacher or leader, help his teammates rise to excellence.

Adrian, being one of the new members of the team, understood that the others would be wary of him and his superior skills. He wished that the entire team would be worthy of his favor. He fantasized about how events might unfold in the years ahead. He and his teammates at international competitions. Colorful ribbons and shiny medals draped across bare chests as they stood on winners' podiums. How they would talk to reporters and praise Adrian for seeing their potential, helping them actualize their skills, how fortunate they were to have met him, been guided by him. More ribbons, more medals. Adrian would garner most of the first-place prizes for himself of course, but competitions offered plenty of second- and third-place honors for his teammates to share. And every time they basked in a spotlight, they'd know they owed that success to him.

Yes, some of his new teammates might have potential. For example, that blond kid with the long legs and broad chest. Impressive physique. Another freshman, new to the team--What was his name?--Race?--Trace?--Something like that. The kid was standing with a swimmer who looked almost exactly like him, only a little older, more muscular, maybe a brother or cousin or something. From his physique, Adrian assessed, Trace might be a capable backstroke swimmer. Cute as hell--probably a sweet-talker used to getting his way with the ladies. Adrian caught the blond staring at him. When Adrian met the kid's eyes, Trace did not look away, and in fact looked back with an expression that was difficult to read but might have been lust or a challenge. Was he trying to intimidate Adrian? The kid had good psych-out techniques.

The two assessed each other for only a moment. Adrian felt a tingle in his scrotum. He decided that, yes, the blond gave off an air of cutthroat competitiveness. Good, Adrian thought, in fact better than good; he could use the challenge to keep him on his toes, keep him from getting complacent.

Obviously, Adrian decided, he and Trace weren't meant to be friends. If that kid was indeed any good, and if Coach Thompson was anything like Adrian's previous coach back in high school, Thompson would likely work to pit the two of them against each other, in and out of the water, go to great lengths to make them challenge each other. Adrian decided he would like that very much--almost as much as he would like crushing the other swimmer.

Adrian wanted his future to be drenched in gold medals. He'd been studying the great Olympic swimmers. Already his butterfly was nearly competitive with theirs, and his freestyle speed had been the best on his high school team. Adrian wanted to see blond Trace in the pool, assess his skills. Would Trace's specialty really be the backstroke, Adrian's weakest? Or would it be a stroke where Adrian was strong? All the better if it was. Adrian could use the extra motivation. Sure, that would alienate many of his teammates, but Adrian knew from experience that in athletics he would gain a lot from an adversarial role. Just like back in high school, he would simply have to take his teammates' inevitable resentment of his success in stride.

Well, all that would have to wait. Coach was calling the team members together and starting the expected welcome to the team, let's have a great year pep-talk, probably filled with the usual clichés. Someone should call him out on his horseshit, for his own good.

# # #

Adrian stood at his locker fuming. Coach Thompson was an asshole!--a major asshole!

Halfway through practice, Coach had called the team together and gave them a speech about team spirit. He'd said, The secret to being a winner isn't your strengths. Not matter what your role, no matter how good you are, when you're emotionally and physically exhausted, the secret to being a winner is being able to some way, somehow, dig down deep inside yourself to find the energy to help the teammate next to you.

And Adrian had told him that was a load of bullcrap; being the winner absolutely was about being the best, being the strongest--and if the rest of the team couldn't keep up, well, there was a reason why most swimmers never got to stand on the winner's podium. He might have used the words losers and failures who just don't know it yet, but so what?--It was true.

Coach had turned several shades of crimson; he'd told the team captain to oversee the rest of the drills, and then he'd hauled Adrian, a death-grip on the swimmer's shoulder, into his tiny office and proceeded to berate him for the rest of practice about his "counterproductive opinions" and "bad attitude," and how he had potential, might have been a big fish in the high school pond, but he'd need to show real improvement real fast to compete at the college level, and if Adrian didn't change his attitude, Coach'd kick him off the team, which would mean the end of his scholarship, and there were a dozen other guys as talented as Adrian who'd love to take his place on the roster. Coach finished the lecture by saying he wanted Adrian to spend the next twenty-four hours carefully considering his place on the team--and Coach Thompson emphasized those words.

Adrian had left the dressing-down with his ears burning and a clear torpedoing of his status and prestige in the eyes of the team, all because Coach saw a bad attitude where Adrian saw the truth. No, maybe Coach and the team had needed that dose of reality Adrian had given them, but Coach's lecture was definitely not the way Adrian expected his first day of practice to go. He'd fucked up, moved too fast, should have let them come to see his superiority first, then spoken out.

Adrian stood in front of his locker, fidgeting and re-fidgeting with stuff in his gym bag and basically stalling. His plan was to ignore everyone, not even acknowledge them, just wait until the others had showered and left before he stripped, showered, and changed into his street clothes. Obviously the whole team had overheard Coach Thompson chewing Adrian's ass and handing it back to him, and some of them kept glancing his way with a strange mix of expressions. Fuck 'em all!--Adrian didn't need their pity! And what was with all the returning swimmers wearing those weird blue briefs with no backs that left their butts on display? Teams usually wore matching jerseys or all shaved their heads as a sign of solidarity. But wearing ass-less underwear?--That was just weird and sad. Having their butt cheeks hanging out made them look like a bunch of queer man-sluts or something. No way would he ever wear something that dumb!

He wondered whether he should cut his losses and transfer schools; too late to do it this semester and get a place on a swim team, so that would mean he'd lose a year. Losing a year was also definitely not in his plan! He'd just have to tough it out this year, and if Coach Thompson kept being an asshole, Adrian could make some inquiries and transfer to another, better team next fall.

"Coach is pissed."

Adrian turned around to see the team captain, wearing jeans, his T-shirt draped over one bare shoulder, arms crossed over his chest. The captain--what the fuck was his name again?--studied him angrily.

Adrian said, "I--"

"Shut it. That mouth of yours already got you in a world of hurt. You need to keep your mouth shut and your head down 'til this blows over. Got it? First day of practice? What the fuck? Did you piss off your previous coaches like that?"

Adrian shook his head. His previous coaches always seemed to know a team always had a star and that star was him. Sure, his past coaches had talked about team-this and team-that, but they never seemed to mean it. Except for relays, swimming was an individual sport, right? Apparently Coach Thompson had a different perspective, and Adrian had sure messed up by not picking up on that.

"Coach is pissed off, and he almost never gets pissed off."

"I didn't mean to ...," Adrian tried to explain, barely able to look at the captain, and he read something unspoken in the older swimmer's man's scowl and shut his mouth.

"You planning to skip out on the team party tonight too?"

He'd already decided not to go. Hang out with a bunch of second-rate jocks?--No way. And now, hang out with a pissed-off coach and a bunch of jocks who heard him get lectured at for nearly an hour?--Oh, hell, no. He didn't need their pity. "I, uh, don't think I'd be too welcome--"

"You are not going to skip. You already skipped out on our camping trip and made me look like a fool--"

"Like I said, something came up--"

"--And you don't got any excuses this time. We call it a party, but it's more like an initiation for all you new guys. Until Coach says otherwise or until you quit, you're part of this team, whether you like it or not. That means you're going to be there for the team initiation. You're gonna drop the superiority attitude, have a good time, and make nice-nice to anyone who wants to have anything to do with you. Coach asked me to keep an eye on you; he trusts my judgment, and if I decide you're not team material, then he's gonna kick you outta here. Whether you're on the team come Monday depends on what happens tonight. Understand? So let me ask you again: Are you planning to skip out on the team party?"

An initiation? Off the team come Monday if he failed? He'd miss the entire season! Losing a year of swimming was not in Adrian's plan. Maybe he should act apologetic, at least until this blew over and the rest of the team got a chance to recognize his skill in the water. Coach wouldn't be pissed once Adrian started bringing in the wins--definitely not pissed then. But the first meet was weeks away. Maybe for now--

Adrian made a show of hanging his head, miming remorse and capitulation, and muttered, "I'll be there."

Charlie leaned in. "And this is the most important part: You're gonna do exactly what I say, right? If I tell you to shut the fuck up, you immediately shut your mouth and don't say another word. If I say you need a time out, you immediately go take a walk around the block or something 'til things cool off. You will do anything I say, understand?"

Adrian gulped. Off the team ... Losing a year .... "Okay. Sure. Anything you say, Chad."

"It's Charlie, numb-nuts. Get it right."

"Sorry. Anything you say, Charlie."

"Go get showered and dressed," the captain ordered quietly. "I'll have one of the guys meet you out front and take you over to the party."

Adrian decided to throw a little more remorse into his voice. "Okay."

Charlie seemed satisfied. He nodded and turned for the door.

Alone in the locker room now, Adrian stripped off his swimsuit. His genitals tumbled free, and he scratched at his balls. "Fucking asshole coach! Fucking captain!" Adrian whispered, and then he sucked in a deep breath, snatched up his towel, and marched toward the showers, still fumbling his potent testicles.

He scrubbed carefully, thoroughly, washing away every trace of pool chlorine, and he smiled contentedly at the warm, virile sensations swirling inside him.

He dried his muscle-hard body with pleased sureness, and he was still smiling to himself as he walked back to his locker. The shower helped clear his head; he felt more like himself again, confident and cocky. Yeah, he had a plan now: he'd just sneak off, ditch the party, and on Monday he'd apologize and say he didn’t feel well or something. Heh. That asshole Charlie and his tries at intimidation!--What an amateur!--Almost as big as asshole as the coach. No way would they really kick him off the team; they were just trying to spook him. Yeah, Adrian would act all repentant, keep up the act until the meets started. After that, his wins would prove he was right.

He dressed in a retro T-shirt, jeans by a designer most of the yokels here probably never heard of, and trainers that likely cost more than Coach--that asshole!--made in a week. He packed his gear and, calm and sure of himself again, he sauntered to out of the locker room. Out front was that way, and the side door was this way. Adrian smirked--those fucking amateurs!--and headed out the door to the side parking lot.

A young man came out of the shadows: dark-haired, swimmer-built, casually dressed, and he seemed to take for granted that Adrian would be there.

Well, fuck! Adrian felt his bravado deflate a little. Time to get his repentant mask back on.

"I'm Diego, in case you forgot," the swimmer announced with a grin, then nodded toward the darkness. "Charlie said to bring you out to the place. The car's over here."

"The place?"

"Where the party's happening. We got a place just outside town. A lot of the team lives there."

"Okay, Diego."

They walked side-by-side across the parking lot, and Adrian settled into the small car as Diego got into the driver seat.

"You're clear to stay overnight, right, Adrian? No one's gonna be waiting up for you or ticked off if you don't come home tonight?"

Stay overnight? The captain hadn't mentioned that. "If Charlie wants me to," Adrian conceded quietly. "He's the boss."

"He's the boss, all right."

Diego seemed to be believing his act. Adrian stared blindly into the night as they drove from the parking lot. He had no idea where they were going or what was in store for him. But tonight, he'd have to play along, do what Charlie said. Adrian would fool them all.

In silence, they sped through the darkness, not far but near the edge of town, and then they were pulling to a stop in front of a large, isolated building. Adrian had expected a house, since Diego said a lot of the swimmers lived there, but this looked more like a small warehouse or windowless commercial building. Automatically, Adrian got out of the car and followed Diego inside.

They entered a large, dull-lit room, a bank of gym lockers against one wall, wooden benches placed carelessly. This was a home? It sure looked more like a locker room. Half a dozen young men from the swim team stood in the shadows, quietly talking and joking. Most of them had stripped off their shirts, and many had stripped all the way down to their weird underwear. They seemed to be waiting for something. This didn't look like a party or an initiation. What the hell?

Charlie came sauntering from the group. He wore a pair of dark jeans that seemed to emphasize his rugged, masculine frame, shirtless, a small pendant in the center of his chest. His deep-set gaze met Adrian's. "Tried to sneak out, huh?" he said coolly. "Don't try denying it. I had somebody waiting out front and Diego here had the side door. Since he's the one who brought you, that tells me you tried to sneak out the side way. That's a second strike against you. You can't afford one more."

Adrian considered denying everything. He could say he was new; the gym layout was still unfamiliar; he just found the wrong door was all. But Charlie had been a step ahead of him, would know he was lying. So: "Okay," Adrian acknowledged.

"At least you didn't make me come get you." Then Charlie's tone went firm, inviting no disobedience. "Pick yourself a locker and strip down to your underwear."

Obediently, Adrian chose an open locker and began to undress slowly. He was aware that some of the other men were ignoring him, and some were looking him over with casual interest, but he concentrated on himself the way he did before a swim meet.

When he was down to his briefs--gold-striped designer briefs, not those silly butt-baring team underwear--he closed his eyes for a moment, steeled himself for his performance.

"C'mon, Adrian; it's time to get started."

Adrian opened his eyes and turned. The other swimmers in the shadows watched silently, and Charlie had stripped to his briefs.

"Coach and Master Tom are busy with some of the other new guys for now, so I'll be handling your initiation."

"Okay," Adrian mumbled. "Anything you say, Charlie."

"That's what I like to hear," Charlie practically purred. He fingered his round pendant. "And I'll be hearin' you say that a lot after--"

# # #

Adrian cracked his eyes, tried to lift his head. His gaze wouldn't focus. He knew he was awake only because of the light--everything seemed a blur of vague lights. He felt dizzy, disoriented, as though the world was spinning one direction and his head was spinning the other. His attempt at What happened came out slurred: "Wuuh'nnd ..."

A voice nearby began, "He's coming around. Go get ...," and then everything faded away again.

Someone tilted his head, patted his cheek. Adrian tried to open his eyes, but nothing seemed to work. Words drifted through his ears: "Hey, guy, you with us? Wakey-wakey." More cheek-slapping, firmer this time.

This time Adrian managed to open his eyes. The lights became shapes, a face. Charlie, smiling, right in front of him. Two other members of the swim team beyond him, all of them in those backless briefs. One of the guys farther back held something, a tray.

Charlie's face grinned, drifted closer. "Easy there, asshole. You D.F.O.'ed on us."

"Whuh?"

"Done Fell Out. Some guys, their first couple of times, the artifacts hit 'em so hard they don't go into a trance--they just pass out and drop where they stand. Especially when it's the red one that opens up. We say 'he Done Fell Out' when that happens."

Adrian was ... sitting? Yes, sitting. In a chair. In a room. Brighter light than the dimness he'd seen when he walked into the party. Concrete floors. Bare walls. He tried to move his hands but they seemed somehow ... fused together?

"Take it easy. You been D.F.O.'ed a couple hours. Was starting to think you'd be out all night. Nothing to be ashamed of. Happened to me too--I D.F.O'ed my first time too, made a real mess of myself too. Happened a few times 'til I got used to the effect. You'll get used to it, eventually, and then you won't D.F.O. as much."

Adrian frowned. He tried to move his hand, but both hands still seemed together somehow. His eyes and brain were starting to decipher what he saw. His arms were crossed at the wrists, zip-tied together. "Tha fuhk ...?" Trying to pull his hands apart made his uni-arm swing in front of him.

"Shh. I said, take it easy." Charlie's voice was firm. His hand on Adrian's wrists pushed them down into his lap, stilled them there. "For your own good--sometimes guys flail around some when a D.F.O. wears off."

Adrian let his hands remain there, limp. In fact, his whole body felt so weird, relaxed and heavy, and he distrusted his limbs' ability to move. "Drugg'd meee," Adrian moaned.

"Nope. No drugs. Just the artifacts, like I said." He looked over his shoulder. "You got them, Diego?"

"Yeah," someone said. Adrian recognized the voice but it sounded strange, thicker than he remembered the other swimmer talking in the parking lot. "Got ... live one already ... too ..."

"Good. Okay, asshole, since you're no good to us knocked completely out, we're gonna introduce you to the artifacts a little gentler this time. A little bit at a time. Diego, bring 'em closer."

Adrian felt--

Dizzy again. Disoriented. Horny. Everything seemed to be happening from some blurry, faraway place. Head rolling. "Huur ...," from his throat.

Charlie's face blurred, and his voice was thicker too, as if whatever-this-was affected him too. "We're losing him ... Back up some ... Diego ... Yeah ... Better ... Still with us ... Adr'an? Yeah ...?"

Adrian felt as if the world was spinning and he was floating, falling, though it. Some weird sensation was washing over him, and his body felt heavy and limp. He couldn't move, couldn't keep his head up. He'd never felt this heavy before, not even at his most exhausted. Every part of his body was too limp to move--except for his hard cock, which he could feel stretching the front of his briefs. He had a momentary flicker--Everyone can see--before the thought slowly spun away. Heavy and horny, and he couldn't do anything about either condition.

"Yeah," Charlie said again, "looks like ... somebody likes it ..." Adrian felt a fingertip run across the front of his briefs, tracing the length of his cock through the fabric, too intimate a touch. He wanted to knock the finger away but couldn't make his hands move. "Don't worry yourself ... kid. When the artifacts start their dance ... every guy in range gets an erection ... even me and the others." Back and forth ran the finger, base to tip to base.

"Ready to get started? Bring 'em ... a little closer, Diego ..."

# # #

Adrian tried to wake up, but couldn't, and slipped back into a space that wasn't quite sleep.

He tried again, got an eye open, felt the world returning. Managed to keep his eyes open, and sat up. A narrow bed. No windows--the overhead light was on.

The world still spun. His head felt like everything in it had been disconnected, scrambled, then reconnected. What the hell happened?

The zip-ties that had secured his wrists were gone. His designer briefs were gone too, and now he wore a pair of those blue butt-less numbers the other swimmers had been wearing. Team underwear something in the back of his mind called them. He tried to stand. The world was slowing, righting itself. Good. Was there a bathroom? There? Good. He managed to steady himself enough to stagger into the adjoining bathroom. He pushed down his team briefs. He dared not try to piss while standing up, now when he was this dizzy, so he sat on the toilet to empty his bladder.

Afterward, he staggered to the bedroom door, deciphered the task of making his clumsy hand grip and turn the knob. A hallway. No windows--was this a basement? Indistinct people sounds--upstairs? If this was a basement, then upstairs meant an exit. He headed toward where he thought stairs might be.

A hand from behind on his shoulder. He was turned to face the two blond swimmers--brothers, he remembered--Carl--no, Curt--and Tracy--Trace--grinning at him, saying something like, "There you are. C'mon, the party's upstairs."

Adrian found himself half-guided, half-hauled the opposite direction, then to a flight of stairs that proved impossible for his inept legs and, with Adrian's arm thrown around his shoulders, the older brother-swimmer Curt practically carried him up them. Which should have been humiliating, except Adrian felt mostly confusion instead.

Around, Adrian saw--Holy crap!--his teammates, most of them naked in the dim light and shadows, a few in briefs, most of them sucking or getting sucked, a few fucking or getting fucked. The sounds he had heard from downstairs were the animal noises of men having sex together--a lot of men!--maybe the whole team!

Adrian was deposited in front of Charlie, and Adrian staggered a little until he found his balance. Already he felt a little steadier.

The naked team captain was sprawled in a large chair, one leg draped over a chair arm, the other stretched out in front of it, and between the captain's thighs knelt a swimmer who was bent over Charlie's crotch, sucking enthusiastically.

"Hey there, Sleeping Beauty. About time you joined us," Charlie said, patting the head of his sucker and saying, "Cool it a while," and once the sucker pulled off his cock, Charlie unsprawled and sat up and grinned big at Adrian. "How ya feeling?"

"I ...dunno?"--which was the truth. "Better?"--which was a guess.

Charlie nodded. "Me and your mind had a real long talk, and we made some changes. You don't remember any of that, I bet, but those changes went in extra-deep because you were D.F.O.'ed. Then you had a real strong orgasm, thanks to the artifacts. You probably don't remember that either, but you'll be feeling the afterglow for a good long while."

Adrian thought about this. Yes, part of what he'd first interpreted as dizziness had something else mixed in, the way he felt sometimes in the minutes after a really good climax, but this was stronger, and the pleasant post-cum lethargy showed no signs of fading yet.

"Your head will feel a little funny 'til the changes finish sinking in. That's normal--Just go with it."

"Changes ...?" Adrian echoed.

"Yep. We're gonna rein you in some, keep an eye on you, make sure the changes start becoming permanent." Charlie leaned forward. "You had an apartment off-campus, right?"

Of course he did. How could a star like Adrian be expected to stay in a lowly dorm with the riffraff students? He did not need a roommate "borrowing" his expensive clothes--and he did not need a former dormmate someday writing a tell-all book after Adrian became famous. He nodded yes.

Charlie grinned wider. "You had an apartment. A couple of the guys are over there right now, packing up yourr shit, bringing it all back here. Most of it'll go into storage, unless it's stuff we decide you'll really need. You'll be moving into my room here, so I can train you as often as possible, keep a close eye on your progress. In order to prove you're part of this team, you're gonna do anything I say from now on, got it? Say it back to me."

Adrian thought about this. He knew he should be angry--no one touched his stuff without permission or made decisions for him--but instead he felt a vague acceptance. Charlie, the team, they were just doing what was right for him. Hadn't his humility and remorse been an act before? Now somehow he felt genuinely remorseful, to the core of his being; he had been such a dick to his Coach, his teammates. He needed to show his penance, needed to stay on the team--needed--needed what? Needed to their guidance. He needed to agree. "Okay. Anything you say, Charlie."

"Made some changes to your class schedule too. Now you'll be taking the same classes as Trace--"

The younger blond appeared at Adrian's shoulder, grinned and nodded at him.

"--And Berto."

A dark-haired Latino stud stood on the other side of Adrian.

"They're gonna be your new bestest friends--after me, that is--and they'll be with you all the time. If you're not with me or with the team, you'll be with them. They're taking freshman survey courses too, and now you're in the same classes they are. If you need to go to the library--if you need to hit the restroom--whatever--you'll have them with you. Got that?"

Adrian considered this. Part of him already knew it, seemed to have already accepted this situation as a fact. He nodded. "Anything you say, Charlie."

"And now the most important change. You're not going to be jacking off solo, are you?"

Adrian thought a moment, then shook his head no.

"From now on, the team owns your cock and your ass and your mouth. We own your orgasms. Any time you get horny, you're gonna come find me and ask for what you want--whether it's a hand-job, a blow-job, or a butt-fuck. And if I'm not around, you'll ask your new best friends"--he gestured at Trace and Berto--"or Master Tom, or Coach, or someone else on the team, in that order. Got it?"

"Anything you say."

"Damn right. Now comes my favorite part--I wanna test how well your new obedience changes took." Charlie lifted his meat-rod, which hadn't softened. "You ever sucked a dick?"

"No."

"Then you're gonna learn by sucking mine. On your knees and get to it."

Adrian hesitated, staring at the naked, hard-cocked swimmer; and then the men on other side of him, Trace and Berto, both had a hand on his shoulders, urging him downward. He should shout Hell, no!--and march off and report this whole team to some college disciplinary board or other. He should have ... He should ...

He should do what he was told.

Adrian found himself not fighting back, sinking to his knees, unable to shift his gaze away from Charlie's very male erection.

The captain's long, thick-shafted prick hovered above his spread thighs, the base hidden in the mass of trimmed pubic hair at his groin, the amber cock-head bulging from a heavy roll of skin at the collar, and his large, free-hanging testicles hung tight and round under the powerful column. Hands grasped Adrian's head, and he closed his eyes and let himself be directed toward the offered organ. This close, it seemed huge to him, though he realized Charlie's cock wasn't that much larger than most men's, or Adrian's own. The musky male scent and faint chlorine smell filled his nostrils, and then his face was being pressed against the warm, bared flesh. An unexpected shiver of excitement surged through him, and he let his lips trace the massive size of the erection. Strong hands held him in place but he wasn't fighting them, and the marble-slick smoothness of the prick-head eased into his mouth.

He swallowed the unfamiliar taste of masculinity, and a numbed warmth of willingness wrapped about him. He felt Charlie patiently, almost gently, feed stiff meat into his mouth, inch by inch. "Take it easy," Charlie said. "Get used to it. You'll be spending a lot of time with this thing in your mouth or up your ass, so make friends with it nice and easy." Adrian shivered again, both with fear and want. He wanted to spit the cock out, and also wanted to swallow it deeper. Physically he struggled to accept the invader without gagging, and finally he had half of it in his mouth--must have been at least half--but, threatening to gag, he could take no more.

Charlie got to his feet, locking the kneeling Adrian between his muscled thighs and holding him face-to-crotch, and he thrust his hips forward, jabbing the tip of his ram a bit deeper into the man's throat. For a long moment, neither swimmer moved, and then Adrian choked violently, pushed back off Charlie's cock entirely, retching, trying not to vomit. With a grunt, Charlie eased back.

Gulping for breath, Adrian fumbled to the floor and opened his eyes, gazing up at the powerfully built athlete standing over him, and he thought about how he felt, how right the words Anything you say felt. He was no virgin but he didn't have a lot of experience, and none with men--he'd never had time for a girlfriend and he'd never done anything with a guy before either, but now he needed to learn. Adrian's own cock throbbed stiffly in his team underwear. He righted himself onto his knees again, focused his eyes to Charlie's heavy hard-on, and he leaned in again toward it.

Charlie pushed Adrian's head away, said quietly, "Not so fast. Your teeth are gonna scrape me raw. We'd better show you how to suck cock. Trace, give him a lesson."

"Hell, yeah!" Trace agreed from beside him.

Berto and Charlie hauled Adrian to his feet; they didn't have to hold him--their presence was enough. Trace moved closer, blond and naked and grinning, wide shoulders and sleek chest tapering to slim hips, his blood-hot prick erect. Without hesitation, Trace went to his knees, peeled Adrian's briefs down to mid-thigh, gripped the freed rigid dick. "Pay attention," Charlie said as Trace nuzzled Adrian's cock with his lips.

Numb, Adrian watched his own arrow-headed crown disappear into the swimmer's mouth and felt the hot, wet tongue move around it, and he tensed as the taunting lip and mouth pressure engulfed more and more of his column. Trace took the full-swollen iron with slow sureness and began suctioning skillfully, and suddenly Adrian was filled with sex-hot sensations that swirled through his body and made thinking difficult. He squirmed and writhed, held in place by the two men beside him, Berto and Charlie, and he felt Trace's hands stroke the sensitive linings of his thighs and caress his churning balls and probe the hardened flesh-ridge leading back between his legs toward his ass.

Adrian groaned with the fast-rising pleasure, and Trace's tongue was doing amazing things. Then--too much!--too soon!--as the climactic eruption ripped through him, Adrian threw his head back and called out hoarsely, "Ah!" Adrian soared into a raging orgasm, his cum pouring out in a searing flow. "Ahhh!"

Adrian was lost in his erotic satisfaction, and almost lazily, he floated back to reality, his cock still in Trace's mouth, his body still secured between Berto and Charlie, his breath a sigh of satisfied exhaustion.

Trace licked Adrian's sensitive, still-hard ram clean and released it, looking up with a broad smile. "Charlie, we got us the makings of a real stud!"

"Dammit, Trace, you weren't supposed to make him cum so quick, but done is done. Trade places," Charlie ordered quietly.

Naked Trace stood up, muscular and cock-hard, and Adrian dropped to his knees automatically. He stared at the rigid male-column thrust toward him, and then, as if in a dream, he bent forward and lapped Trace's rod into his mouth.

He knew Charlie was watching, and he tried to copy everything Trace had done.

He was only vaguely aware of the size and taste of the blond swimmer's throbbing prick. It was slightly shorter than Charlie's, and Adrian managed it easier. Once he had the whole thing in his mouth, he suctioned from tip to base almost hungrily, felt it hammer into his throat, quiver steel-hard. Up and down, he went, tip to base to tip. How long would he have to keep repeating this? As long as necessary.

Just as his burning jaw was beginning to become too painful he heard Trace make a sound, and he felt the first lightning bolt of Trace's nut-juice strike in his mouth, a strange taste, thick cum spurting. Success! He'd done it!--Made Trace cum! Adrian swallowed the gushing sperm and held the pulsing rod. "Not bad," Trace judged, "but he definitely needs more practice." Then Trace was pulling away; another man took his place.

Silently, as if completing a ritual, five or six of his new teammates took a turn. Though his jaw ached, Adrian accepted the demanding studs, even Berto's large-sized rod though he had to struggle with it. Adrian remembered everything he did that made them moan or caress his head, but otherwise his mind felt strangely blank, obeying Charlie's orders. Anything you say ...

And then: Charlie himself!

The naked swim captain stood over him, feet spread, hands on hips, his massive cock full-swollen and angled toward Adrian. The huge shaft was etched with taut veins, and the mallet-shaped head gleamed, a droplet of clear liquid leaking at the tip.

Strangely pleased that he was the cause of Charlie's open, hard-cocked excitement, Adrian bent forward to the meat-rod, pressing his lips to the crown, and licked it with tongue flicks as his fingertips tease-caressed the shaft.

Charlie's hand dropped onto Adrian's head, patting him as if he were a puppy. Adrian sucked the big cock into his mouth, nursing it all the way into his throat. He pressured gently and began suctioning. Anything you say ... He was part of the team, submitting to his team captain willingly.

Working steadily, Adrian ran his palms upward over Charlie's swimming-shaved thighs, into his crotch, fingered his large, tightened balls, stroked his muscle-taut belly, felt the masculine body respond.

"Much better. You're learning."

Adrian felt himself flush at the praise.

He continued to suck, found a rhythm. Suddenly, Charlie's hand on Adrian's head became a grip. "Get ready." And Charlie creamed, holding Adrian's head in place as the captain pushed his convulsing prick hilt-deep in new swimmer's mouth and throat, holding it there, his cum pouring out in powerful spurts. Adrian struggled to swallow every drop of the flow and finally came off the cock to gulp helplessly for air, feeling the final spurt strike his lip and cheek. As the last of the captain's cum dribbled out, Adrian wrapped his arms about Charlie's thighs, clinging to him, needing ... what? Needing something he couldn't name.

It ended, and he continued to hold onto the relaxing man's body in the silence that followed. Then Charlie patted him on the head and eased free of Adrian's grip. "Yeah, you're learning. Keep that up and you'll be a great part of the team, once we're done training you."

Adrian stayed on his knees and, as he looked down at his own cock hanging hard and ignored over the top of the briefs that Trace had only pulled down a little way. Adrian couldn't help smiling at the glistening hard-on rising from his crotch. He needed to cum--Charlie said he must ask for what he--

"Get him ready for the others. But no artifacts--no one does that to him tonight but me, and I want him awake and not D.F.O.-ing on us," Charlie ordered. "Put the bitch chains on him. I'm making him our designated bitch for the night."

His new best friends closed in on Adrian, and he let them strip his briefs the rest of the way off, let them haul him to a shadowed back wall, and clamp thick metal slave-cuffs on his wrists and ankles, cuffs attached heavy chains. Adrian didn't resist. They kept him standing upright and forced him to spread his legs and they hooked the ankle chains to floor bolts, and then overhead ropes were snagged to the wrist chains. In silence, they tightened the ropes, stretching him spread-eagle, and then they moved out of sight.

Adrian tensed his muscles and tested the bindings futilely, then relaxed. Knowing he couldn't escape, knowing the inevitable, brought a kind of peace. His team was here, all around him. Instead of shame, he felt an odd sense of safety, security. He was held there, naked and helpless, and he waited with trusting calmness for whatever Charlie had in store for him.

At last, young men surrounding him silently, not Charlie or his best friends, but other swim team members. Their hands ran over his fully exposed body lazily, then more hungrily, and he felt a taunting, sexual yearning stir in him. He heard their excited breathing, and they squirmed against him, stiffening cocks pressing against his bared skin. He'd been around hundreds of men in swimsuits or underwear or naked, and they'd never aroused him. Now he couldn't imagine feeling anything other than horny excitement and a need to cum--and soon!

He stifled a groan of frustration as his own prick returned to throbbing hardness, and then he felt Charlie behind him. He couldn't see back there but he knew the man was Charlie, already knew the powerful arms embracing him. He felt the man's firm-muscled chest against his shoulder blades, the man's thick, firm rod pressing at the narrow cleft in his ass.

Charlie's voice in his ear: "Ever been whipped, Adrian? Or fucked?"

"No." He knew he shouldn't argue with what the swim captain wanted, but he quivered with alarm, his voice a whine: "Don't ... Please, Charlie ... I don't want to be ... Don't want to be--you know."

"Get him ready," Charlie said to the others and pulled away. "But don't use the artifacts. I want him clear-headed while we work him over."

The fingers pawing over him became rougher, pinching and probing and jabbing, and he wrenched against the chains holding him. Metal clamps were attached to his small, dark nipples. "Ow!" A heavy chain was wrapped around his balls, separating them and weighting them down. Dull, aching pain ate into his brain.

"Open your mouth, Adrian."

Charlie stood in front of him, holding a ball-gag. No--this wasn't Charlie; this was one of the other swimmers. But Adrian wanted him to be Charlie and somehow seemed to see the man as Charlie. Adrian opened his mouth to accept the gag, felt the straps secured around the back of his head to hold the ball in place.

In his free hand, another not-Charlie gripped a black leather belt, and he stared at Adrian deliberately, then stepped behind him.

Adrian braced himself and waited. Punishment was coming--for his ego and attitude, for his argument with Coach, for his, well, everything. Punishment he deserved. Punishment to burn the errors out of him and make him a better person, a better team member. And after what seemed like an eternity, he heard the whistle of the belt cutting the air, and knew he had to take it, wanted to take it. Needed to prove--

He heard the brutal snap as it slashed across his shoulders. Half a second later, he felt the lance of fire searing through his struck bare flesh and his thoughts.

Again.

Again.

With each lash-blow, his yowl of agony died against the ball-gag. Adrian clenched his eyes shut and bit down hard on the gag between strokes, and he pictured himself before, kneeling before the swim captain. Pictured ...

Then came the gradual numbing of the body, then the mind ... Happening to someone else, not Adrian ...

The whipping continued, slow, steady, deliberate, and Adrian felt as if he were floating in a dream, part of him writhing and groaning in a sea of pain, part of him willingly submitting to not-Charlie's torture to become better. He was aware that the other not-Charlies were tightening the clamps on his nipples and adding weight to the chain on his nuts. His lower back and thighs were seared with bruising welts from the slashing belt.

A pause. Adrian opened his eyes, saw Charlie, the real one, studying him. Charlie held out his hand, took the belt, and stepped behind Adrian. Charlie's first blows flogged the slim arcs of Adrian's ass with the heavy leather lash, which hadn't been touched until now, as if the predecessors had been saved for the real Charlie. Again. Again.

At last, the beating ended, and the air was silent. Adrian drifted, dazed. From far away he felt the swimmers remove the gag from his mouth, the clamps from his tits, the chained weights from his balls, and Adrian felt his semi-stiff cock bob from his crotch as they loosened the bindings and let him sag to the floor.

He was naked except for the manacles on his wrists and ankles, a chain connecting his wrists, one connecting his feet. He lay face-down, pressing his burning bare skin against the cool floor, and he felt the young jocks crouch about him and rub his welt-raked back with a lotion that soothed the sensations.

He floated in pain-numbed pleasure.

A man hunched between Adrian's spread legs and oiled his upturned ass, and he knew that man was Charlie, massaging the burning cheeks of his ass gently, easing them apart and probing into the narrow passage between them, locating his muscle-tight asshole, and finger-greasing it repeatedly. His hazy thoughts realized what was about to happen. No! If fucking was to be done, he wanted to be the one who fucked, not got fucked. But--he needed to be disciplined, punished, purged, guided, made new. He needed Charlie to--

Something slipped away. Adrian wasn't sure who he was anymore, but he knew who he needed to become. He lifted his tight little tail to meet the fingers, felt them rub, stroke, press, tease, felt his ass-lips gradually relax and begin to throb. He needed ... Needed ...

"Get up on your hands and knees," Charlie drawled with his usual quiet authority.

Adrian shifted into position obediently, and he sucked in a sharp breath as the powerfully built swimmer moved in behind him. "Please ...," Adrian tried, but please what? Don't? No, this was inevitable. Go easy? Maybe that was closer.

Charlie's voice: "Try to relax and it'll go better--for both of us."

But relax how? Adrian felt the captain's slick cock-head nudge between his buns and rub across the tensing opening, then pressure, and Adrian gasped at the hard stabbing sensation as the cock breached him and thrust inward, collar-deep. Charlie arm-locked Adrian's body back against the intruder, and Adrian couldn't escape. The bright scream of pain in his hole, the dull roar of more pain over his back and butt cheeks, all of it merged into a red haze where he couldn't tell anything apart anymore. He needed ...

After a long pause, Charlie began inching the rigid invader deeper and deeper into Adrian. Though still manacle-cuffed, Adrian knew he wasn't being held, except by Charlie's steadying arm; he could've but didn't pull away, couldn't seem to push himself to make that first move. Adrian choked for breath and squirmed, trying to adjust himself to the slow, deliberate penetration, and he heard his own throat-tight groan as Charlie's pubic stubble at the base of his meat ground against his taut-curved ass. Charlie withdrew part-way and thrust again, as if to reinforce his domination over Adrian.

Floating in a numb space, Adrian opened his eyes and saw his spread hands, fingers clawing helplessly at the floor, the wide manacles on his wrists connected by a heavy chain, bitch chains, their bitch for the night, and he knew the other teammates were watching him, watching the champion swimmer humbled and hunched slave-like while Charlie bitch-fucked him, watching him prove his obedience, his belonging. Adrian felt strangely content and willing, maybe even ... eager? Yeah, eager. He was beginning to want this.

Charlie hip-pumped almost gently at first, then more aggressively. The strokes still hurt, but mixed in was something that felt good, something spreading. A surge of sex-hunger swirled through Adrian, overwhelming the pain and numbness with arousal and shards of pleasure. He heard himself gasp, "Charlie ... Awww, fuck, Charlie ... Fuck me ... I need ..."

The older athlete sank back on his haunches, dragging Adrian with him, back to chest, and forcing him to sit squarely on the thrusting ram. Adrian slumped into the man's embrace. "Take it, Adrian," Charlie growled. "Take it all!"

The powerful cock connected their bodies. It hammered into his guts with piston-like precision, punishing him, making him better, and Adrian lost track of the minutes that Charlie's thrashing body was clamped against his back, powerful arms locked about him.

He felt the strong fingers, multiple hands, paw over his chest and stomach, then descend into his crotch. Someone's hand clamped his overstimulated balls securely, and another gripped his inflamed prick, pumping it in rhythm with the pounding cock in his tail.

Ask for what you want ... "Fuck, Charlie! I need to--Please lemme--Awww, shit!" Adrian dropped his head back, and groaned again, whispered, "You bastards--I'm gonna--I love you bastards!--I love you bastards!" He wasn't talking about one person; he was talking about the team. The first lightning shocks of climax arced through him. "I need--I'm gonna--Lemme--Ahhh!"

Charlie said, "Cum for me."

Adrian's eyes, clenched shut, didn't see the sperm fountain from his firmly clenched cock, and he howled through the ecstasy while Charlie's brutal-hard dick drove to his core and convulsed. Lost in the obliterating pleasure, Adrian writhed back against the man holding him, submitting and accepting. The moment lasted as never before, lasted, and Adrian was only vaguely aware of being lowered, pressed to the floor again, pinned beneath Charlie's solid, masculine heaviness.

So distant time later, Charlie pulled up on all-fours, withdrawing his still-firm rod, and Adrian felt the stretched lips of his asshole snap shut as the wide-crowned glans slid free.

He sensed that Charlie had gotten to his feet and that the other teammates were closing in around him. He heard grunts, moans, and then he felt a spray of hot liquid sweep over his back and another, another. Adrian twisted to look over his shoulder and saw Charlie looming over him, hands on hips, as teammates stroked their cocks aimed at him. As Adrian watched, another cock shot out a white liquid, and he felt it strike his freshly belted and fucked ass cheeks. He closed his eyes and squirmed slowly beneath them.

When it ended, he lay semen-drenched and motionless, once again floating in dream-like numbness.

He was vaguely aware of distant sounds, and he turned on his side and opened his eyes. His gaze focused on the heavy chain strung between his wrists, droplets of someone's sperm glistening on the shining links, and he viewed it with curious satisfaction. Connections ... Need ...

The sounds caught his attention again, and he shifted to the shadows on the opposite side of the room. These were groans and gasps and mumbled words of excitement, and he recognized the naked swimmers, dim-lit bodies locked together, sucking, fucking ...

"Want to join them, Adrian?"

Adrian found Charlie toweling the sweat off himself lazily, naked and unashamed, sitting on one of the locker room-type benches beside where he lay chained.

"Whatever you say, Charlie."

"Damn right. Whatever I say. C'mere."

Under Charlie's determined, evaluating stare, Adrian crawled closer, automatically crouching head-down in front of him.

"Lift your hands.

Adrian did, and he watched Charlie unbolt the chain from his wrists, leaving the wide manacle cuffs. "Better get you cleaned up. Coach wants me to give you another training session with the artifacts before we call it a night. Think you can walk?"

Adrian nodded, followed numbly as Charlie led him down a side hallway and into a large, gym-style communal shower room. The walls were tiled, and Adrian smiled. "It's like a locker room," he murmured. "Like when the team--"

Charlie started one of the sprays. "Coach and some of the guys spent most of the summer turning this old building into a place for the team. Upstairs is like a locker room. Downstairs is where most of the team sleeps. I'm the only one who has a bed upstairs; one of the perks of being captain, I guess." He checked the water temperature, stepped back. "Wash up."

Adrian took soap from a wall holder and began lathering himself thoroughly, and he remembered other shower rooms. Naked young athletes soaping off the sweat after practice or the chlorine after a meet. Well-muscled bodies glistening. Flopping cocks openly displayed ... How had he missed how sexual ...?

The heavy manacle cuffs on his wrists, the cuffs around his ankles, the chain connecting his feet--constant reminders that the disciplining was not yet over. Good--he needed to be made better. The spraying water stung his welt-streaked back and ass as he rinsed, and he realized Charlie was at the far end of the room, standing by the wall with his arms folded across his bare chest and watching steadily. Swimmer-clipped hair and rugged, set features. Powerful shoulders and biceps. Solid, mature build. Loose-dangling prick and balls. Like the winner of a swim meet waiting on the first-place podium to receive his medal.

Finished, Adrian turned off the taps and found Charlie tossing him a towel, the towel he'd been using himself, and Adrian wiped his torso and limbs with the already damp cloth.

"Like Trace said," Charlie drawled around a yawn. The hour must've been getting late. "You got the makings of a real stud, Adrian. Good-lookin', damn good build--hung like me."

"I guess I've never thought about it."

"We just gotta get you trained and make sure it sticks, make sure that bad attitude don't come back." He paused. "Ever fuck a guy?"

"No. Do you want me to ...?"

"Maybe I'll let you hump Trace's ass tomorrow. He's turning into kind of a slut for butt stuff, likes riding a guy's pecker." Charlie viewed Adrian as if inspecting livestock, then shrugged. "Maybe I'll ram your ass again at the same time." He turned toward the hallway. "Follow me."

Adrian followed, still drying himself, the chain hooked between his ankles rasping again the hall floor. The two men entered a small, dimly lit room, a simple bed at one side, a small table next to it, a chest for clothes, no other furniture. They hadn't gone downstairs, so--

"Your room, Charlie?"

"Yeah." Charlie sprawled on his back on the bed, his arms folded behind his head. "You're shackin' up with me for your last training session tonight. Figured it'd be easier, in case you D.F.O. again. Lie down."

"Okay." Adrian eased onto the bed, lying back, feeling his whipped back and ass protest. "I didn't mean to yell like a baby, earlier, when you said you were gonna fuck me."

"It can sure hurt, the first time."

"I think I was more scared than hurt, at first." Then Adrian turned on his side toward Charlie and brought one hand up hesitantly to display the wide manacle on his wrist. "I'm glad you left the cuffs on me. It makes me feel more--you know."

"Master Tom said to. Figured you might need them as reminders, at least until the changes've completely sunk in. There's a slave collar that goes with them, too. Maybe you can earn that tomorrow."

A prize to be earned? A new goal? "Anything you say, Charlie."

"I like hearing you say that. We'll chain you up again ... Work on you other ways, too ... Edging. Gang-fuck." Charlie didn't object as Adrian's hand came down to rest on his solid-muscled chest. "You shouldn't have skipped the camping trip or mouthed off to Coach, but we'll get you trained up right. We'll make you part of the team. Can you tell me the Three Rules?"

Adrian thought a moment, then said: "I serve Master Tom--" A blank space. "Who's 'Master Tom'?"

"You would've met him on the camping trip if you hadn't skipped. But you'll meet him in the morning, after he's done with the other new guys. Keep going."

"I serve the artifacts--"

Charlie tapped the small disk on a necklace chain that lay on the bedside table.

"--and I, uh, I serve the team?"

"You asking, or telling?"

"Telling. I serve the team."

"Good," Charlie yawned. "Got them out of order, but you got them. You're learning. Maybe Coach is right and we can make something outta you yet."

Adrian watched his fingers trace over the older swimmer's slow-rising chest, and suddenly he smiled to himself, wondering if Charlie ever took the position Adrian had been in before, picturing the rugged captain kneeling naked before him in submission, sucking his cock, accepting whatever beatings and torment Adrian chose, spreading his ass cheeks to get fucked ...

He felt the man shift beside him, spreading his legs and stretching his arms lazily, and Adrian squirmed downward, stroking Charlie's muscle-ridged torso with his lips and hands. Suddenly, he dropped lower, pressing his face into the older swimmer's crotch, and he inhaled the taunting male scent hungrily. His own cock jammed throbbing-hot into the mattress beneath him, but Charlie's organs lay relaxed and flesh-soft under Adrian's lips.

Adrian nudged the heavy-headed prick to one side, and for the first time, he worked his lips over the captain's loose-sacked testicles, licking them, separating them with his tongue and suctioning first one and then the other into his mouth, hoping the liquid warmth gave the older swimmer pleasure; and then Charlie's hand was on his head, stroking his hair and urging him back. "I'm going to use the artifact to train you again, like Coach and Master Tom want, then maybe I'll fuck your ass again after," Charlie drawled, and he gripped his flaccid cock-base with his free hand. "You'll probably be out of it when I get around to fucking you again, so if you want to suck on my cock a little first, you best go for it now."

Anything you say, Charlie!

Charlie tapped his soft cock-head against Adrian's lips, and Adrian opened his mouth and took it flange-deep willingly. He felt the first shock of sex-heat jerk through Charlie's powerful rod, felt it begin to swell, and he remembered when the triumphant captain had worked it all the way into his throat before.

But not this time! Yeah, Charlie was hot for what Adrian was eager to do, and Adrian, the humbled and beaten and manacled swimmer-slave, was going to make his master crawl! Lick and suck his rigid prick until Charlie groaned with the aching need to unload. Nip on his nut-sack. Stroke him all over with fingers and tongue. Get him so horny he'll beg for release. Keep him worked up for hours, maybe. And, finally, let him pop. Drink down his spurting cum.

Contentedly, Adrian began to service the athletic swimmer who'd conquered him, as he saw Charlie reach for his artifact pendant on the bedside table.

# # #

Everyone knew the rivalry between their two schools was intense, and the men's swim meets were no exception. Adrian didn't know how the rivalry got started, years ago, well before he came here, but everyone accepted it as a fact. Even before the meet started, the teams were catcalling, teasing, yelling insults, trash-talking the moment they laid eyes on each other.

Losing had consequences--everyone knew that--and by tradition whoever lost had to do a chore for the winner. One year the winners made the losers wash their cars. Another year, the losers had to pick up trash along a mile of road in front of the college.

By tradition, the winning team captain decided on the "punishment" chore for the losers. This year, since he was captain and would be graduating in the spring, Charlie asked for something special.

Their rivals lost the Saturday meet, but Charlie and the team weren't celebrating--not yet. As dark began to fall, they dressed quickly, then hid in the bushes that lined the athletic center parking lot where the rival team's bus was parked, lying in wait.

Sure enough, soon the side door that led to the visiting team's locker room opened, and the rival swimmers started filing quickly out, not exactly sneaking, but hurrying. "You're right--Those losers're trying to skip out on us," Adrian said, not quite quietly enough.

"Shh," Charlie hissed. He watched the line of rival swimmers, freshly showered and changed into street clothes, gym bags or backpacks slug over their shoulders, as they hurried dejectedly toward their bus; probably they thought they were about to get away without consequences.

The gym door opened again, and Coach Thompson walked out, heading toward his car.

"Hey, Thompson!" the rival coach hollered. "Good match. Your team's come a long way in the last couple'a years."

Coach waved back. "Thanks. Both teams had a great match. Hey, you aren't trying to duck out on the tradition, are you?"

"Us? Naw--we just gotta get on the road is all. Maybe next year."

About half the rivals were on the bus. Charlie stage-whispered to the rest of the team, "Okay, on three. One. Two ..."--then yelling--"Three!"

The whole masked team stormed out of their hiding spaces and swarmed down on the shocked rivals. In a second the running team intersected the tail-end of the line of rivals, grabbing, pulling, hauling several of them along. Their rivals' panicked cried filled the air:

A panel van screeched up. In seconds, before the rest of the losers could tumble out the narrow bus door, Charlie and his team had dragged several of the rival swimmers along with them, began shoving them into the van's cargo door.

"Hey, Thompson!--What the fuck!" the rival coach bellowed. "You can't just kidnap a bunch of my swimmers!"

Buzz, still strolling toward his car, shrugged and grinned. "All I see is a bunch of masks. What makes you think it's my team? Don't worry--I'll bet whoever-they-are deliver your boys to you safe and sound ... tomorrow night at the latest."

"Don't play games with me, you asshole--!" the rival coach yelled, hands in the air, the rest lost as someone slammed the door and the van sped away.

# # #

The captive rivals in the van were quickly subdued. Burlap hoods were bagged over their heads. Their hands were zip-tied behind them. They were shit-scared, outnumbered, and had no idea what was happening to them, surrounded by voices yelling:

The van drove around for twenty minutes, making many turns to confuse the captives' sense of direction. Then it stopped.

Suddenly: quiet.

Charlie's voice: "Okay, guys, listen up. Yeah, I'm talking to you, numb-nuts. Don't pretend you can't hear me through those hoods--you can hear me just fine. Don't bother yelling for help; no one's gonna hear you. So listen up, 'cause I'm gonna tell you a little bit about what's in store for you. You fuck-heads lost the meet, so for the next twenty-four hours your asses belong to us. You might as well settle back and enjoy it. Okay, get their hoods off."

The rough burlap was pulled away, rival team members blinked as their eyes adjusted to the sudden circle of light that illuminated just them, the rest of the room in shadows. They jerked at the zip-ties holding their hands behind them. A couple of the rivals fixated on Charlie, just outside the edge of the light and stripped to his team underwear and artifact pendant, and they rage-bellowed the expected crap about better let us go and know who you are and go straight to the cops.

Charlie laughed. "Naw, you won't. I'm not tellin' ya what's in store for you, but I'll tell you this. You'll wake up and you won't remember a damn thing--and that's okay. You're gonna enjoy everything we do to you, so you won't mind not remembering ..."

Adrian and the rest of the team stripped down to their team underwear while Charlie played the showman and delivered his speech to the captured rivals. Adrian stood with Trace and Berto in the shadows against the far wall, the farthest from the spectacle, because as freshmen they were still the most susceptible to the artifacts, and sometimes Adrian still D.F.O.'ed. Which always embarrassed him when he woke up, because by now he was no beginner, was experienced enough to be remembering part of what happened. But what could he do? He couldn't change reacting so strongly to the artifact effect.

Charlie was dealing with an unruly rival: "Hey, stand still, asshole. Yes, you. Stand still before you ... Oh, boo-hoo. Fell on your ass, did you? Big fuckin' surprise, with your hands tied behind your back. Now maybe you'll listen and stay the fuck still. I got my foot on your balls, and you do not want me to press down, do you? Then keep your mouth shut. Good. No, we're not gonna drug you. The only thing you need to know is for the next twenty-four hours your asses belong to us, we're gonna do whatever we want to you, and if you remember anything at all, I'll bet it's that you enjoyed the hell out of all of it. Got that?"

Adrian and his new best friends Berto and Trace stood away so Adrian would at least remember the start, just in case he D.F.O.'ed when Charlie finally got around to calling for the artifacts. Adrian was eager to see those fucking assholes get introduced to the artifacts, eager to see their anger-twisted expressions slowly begin to go slack, to see their muscles relax as they were overcome. And if Charlie's spiel was running long, hell, Adrian thought with a grin, this had been the captain's idea so let him enjoy his moment, right?

Charlie ...

A nudge to Adrian's bare shoulder, a familiar presence beside him. Berto. A shared smile. "You okay? Any bad thoughts?"

Adrian mulled this. In the last couple of months, wow, life had changed for him more than he would have considered possible. He wished his fling with Charlie had lasted longer than it did, but after a few intense--and intensely sexual--weeks, once the basics of the "special training" sessions were complete, Charlie relegated Adrian to Berto and Trace's room and went back to his usual captain duties. Adrian had always known that serve the team was one of the Rules, not serve Charlie. And if Charlie's loyalty and major emotional connection was always to Coach, well, Adrian supposed anyone who'd been intensively introduced to the artifacts by one guy maybe bonded tightest with that guy. And anyway, serving the team and getting his rocks off with his hottie teammates was a great replacement--and he still got to enjoy Charlie's cock, ass, and mouth now and then.

Adrian nudged Berto's shoulder back, and shook his head no to answer the question, and meant it. No bad thoughts. He'd been on a team since he started swimming, but being part of a team was something new he hadn't realized he'd been missing. Serve the team. Yeah!

And anyway, maybe Charlie and Coach and Master Tom had always meant for Adrian's major attachment to be his new best friends, Berto and Trace. Adrian leaned against Berto's bare shoulder next to him, felt Trace on the other side slide an arm around his back and squeeze Adrian's bare butt-cheek. Adrian's cock already half-hard with anticipation and he could see Trace's dick--that horndog!--already peeking out over the waistband of his sexy team briefs. Adrian knew that cock very well by now, and Berto's too, knew them as well as he knew his own. The artifacts always ratcheted up a guy's sex-drive, Coach said, and that was sure the case with the three of them--keeping Trace's horniness satisfied between team sessions required both Berto and Adrian!

They'd been virtually inseparable during and after Adrian's training--Coach had called it a probation phase, but Adrian saw it as just a different kind of training program--and Adrian was always amazed, looking back, by how easily he had fallen into harmony with them. Maybe it was because of the artifacts, or because they were always together whenever Adrian wasn't with Charlie for a "special training" session, or because Adrian was getting off together with Berto and Trace at least once or twice a day even outside of the team's post-practice sex. As Berto and Trace's long-term friendship and new sex turned into a real relationship, they hadn't closed themselves off from Adrian--they had invited him in. Now Adrian couldn't fathom how he got by without them.

"Trace and I are gonna head downstairs now." Berto again, rubbing his hard-on through his team underwear, as if Adrian could possibly misunderstand what going downstairs with Trace would mean. Downstairs meant the bedroom they shared. The bedroom meant the bed, and the bed inevitably meant ... "You coming?"

Adrian frowned. "You're not gonna stay?" Across the room, Charlie seemed to be winding down his performance, calling for Diego and Curt to get the one who fell back on his feet. Soon Charlie would hold up the artifact he wore on a chain and--

"Nah. We don't want to wait behind the whole team for a shot at them. Besides, we can fuck them in the morning. They ain't going anywhere for a while."

Which made sense. Trace got grouchy whenever he had to wait to cum--the downside of being an insatiable horndog, Adrian supposed. When Trace got horny, Berto and Adrian had to take care of him, and vice versa.

"Besides," Berto continued, holding up something round and metallic, just a little larger than a coin. "I borrowed something special from Master Tom, just for us."

Adrian had seen Trace's hard-on. Berto's too. His team needed him, and he needed to serve the ...

The rivals would still be there in the morning, Charlie too. But right then? "Wait for me," Adrian said, following them.