Chapter 26.   Cold Cox Academy*

*The author wishes to thank Corsair for his contributions to the fight scenes.

The next day, just after lunch, I stopped in the bank branch near my office and got on the short line to my favorite teller.  I had checks from several customers to deposit and needed a cash withdrawal.  Tanisha looked pretty and very professional as usual.  When she saw me standing at her window I saw a distinct blush suffuse her face.

“What can I do for you today Mr. Steelforth?” she asked.

While her greeting was not unfriendly, I thought she was making an effort to stay more formal and businesslike than in the past and I noted that she avoided making eye contact with me.

“Just the usual, Tanisha”, I said nonchalantly, as though nothing unusual had happened between us the day before.  

I felt this was neither the time nor the place to get into any discussion of yesterday’s events.  I checked my receipt, counted my cash, gave her a warm smile and left the bank.

That evening I rode in the back of my car while my driver took me toward the South Bronx address Dr. Henderson had given me.  By now we were in the blighted area.  My driver radioed ahead to let them know we would soon arrive.  I saw fires in barrels and homeless hopeless men standing around, bottles in hand.  As we approached the old warehouse that was the school I could see that it was battle-scarred with boarded-up windows.  There was no parking.  When the car approached the warehouse, a garage door opened.  Standing in the doorway was a slender, barefoot, white-haired woman wearing only a short sleeved white cotton robe that came down to mid thigh.  Any momentary doubt I might have had about the physical fitness of a woman her age was quickly put to rest by the lean muscularity of those arms and legs.  She was puffing on a cigar.  She waved for us to drive inside.  As soon as my car got in, the door closed.  I indicated to my driver that he should stay with the car while I got out to speak with the woman.
 
"Are you William Steelforth?"  I nodded.  She extended her hand.  "I'm Sue Coxwain.  

I coughed when I got a whiff of her cigar.

Doctor Henderson said that you are seeking treatment for a rape victim.  You have come to the right place.  My student’s affectionate nickname for this place is “School of Hard Cox”.   May I have the name of your friend, the rape victim?"

"That's private," l protested.

"If you want my help you'll have to trust. I understand that trust doesn't come easy to victims.  And when someone close to you gets raped, you are a victim, too.  If you want to watch, I'm going to insist that you do so in the raw like everybody else.”

"Besides”, she continued, “you will have to be naked with many of these same couples if you partner with your rape victim in the encounter group.  I am sure Dr. Henderson must have explained that part to you" Sue pointed out.

I could feel the blood rushing to my face and hoped she did not sense my embarrassment.  I started to object--but guilt stopped me.  Stephanie was unable to sleep at night at least in part because of me.  She was unable to trust men because the routine enslavement process my agency had participated in resulted in her being wrongfully sentenced to a ten-year indenture for debts that she didn't owe.  

"Tonight's session isn't being permanently recorded.  We just give out clips to the trainees so that they can learn from their own mistakes.  You won't appear on video at all.  The girls have to unlearn being helpless."

"They train naked?" I asked.  "What good would that do?  People wear clothes in public.  It's the law."

"I'm glad you brought that up, Mr. Steelforth."

"Please call me Bill." 

"Then you'll call me Susan or Sergeant Major, but do NOT call me ma'am.  It is insulting!"

"Yes, ma'--" I gulped nervously.  Somehow I knew that the little slip of a woman was very dangerous.  "Yes, Susan."

"I'm finished with this”, she said putting out the cigar.  

“I smoke one to relax me," Sue glared at Bill.  "Good.  No lecture on how bad bacca is for me.  I'm an old woman.  This and my boy toy Tomcat and a good brandy are about the only hobbies I have.  I lived through the Insurgency.  That's why I teach close combat to women and to couples who have had one or both partners raped.  Aztlan insurgents were like wolves among the sheep because the US government prohibited self-defense.  If an underground group tried that today in New York City, those punks run a risk of having their asses kicked by one of my students.  One of my students made the news a while ago--have you heard of Stephanie Glenn?  According to the news, she fought off one kidnap attempt and then escaped from a dungeon.  She was a student of mine.  I never forget a name or face."

I stared at Susan in astonishment.

"Ms. Glenn is the rape victim Dr. Henderson told you about," I said at last.  “She was raped while a captive of Zigler and the boys, but more importantly she was raped repeatedly while enslaved.”

"That changes things," Susan mulled it over.  "Are you coming inside?  The students have had their twenty minutes of warm-up exercises.  The core of my teaching method is that my students learn to fight and defeat my Rape-Bots.  Perhaps Dr. Henderson explained that part.”
 
“Yes, he did”, I replied.

“The reason I use sexual attack robots is because I want realism and I want my students to release all inhibitions and fight to kill or maim their attacker.  This is obviously not possible if I have students fighting other students.  The robots, however, are typically set to one-quarter speed and one-quarter power until I know the student can handle more.”

“Even so, are there not injuries when students fight robots?”  I said.

“Injuries are minimized by the students first learning to fight in the virtual machines.  What sort of unarmed defense training do you have?"

"The standard stuff given in high school and college," I replied.  "Plus I've gotten instruction in controlling unruly slaves."

"When was the last time you trained?" Sue asked.  "For that matter, when did you work out last?"

"Well, I've been busy," I said defensively.

"What I teach here is very lethal," Sue said.  "I was part of a commando unit.  It is simple to learn, simple to retain.  We learned to kill with our bare hands.  For rape victims I don't water down the course.  I had to follow New York Unified Police Forces guidelines for their defensive training, but students like Miss Glenn prove that I'm the best.  Stephanie obviously quit when she disabled her two attackers.  Police want living suspects to arrest.  Commandos can't leave live enemies behind them.  If you accept Doctor Henderson's treatment plan, your intensive hand-to-hand combat training will make you far more dangerous to street punks than they are to you."

"Look, I'm no killer commando," I objected, "I'm not an athlete, either."

"The only thing that has to be in shape is your mind," Sue said.   When you are threatened, you can trigger a response that will leave your attackers dead, dead, dead.  You will be in control of that, but you can turn on your inner tiger.  Few humans will be able to harm you when you finish.  Now, do you want to come in or are you going to stand here in the cold.

I left my driver with the car and followed Susan in through the thick door from the garage to the gym.  The first thing my eyes saw was twenty-four students – six of them in well fitting but rather worn out looking street clothes and the rest all quite naked.  Among the six clothed ones at the far end of the gym I noted Tanisha and Leroy.  

“How come those six are clothed and everyone else is naked?” I asked.

“Those six have dressed for combat with my Rape-Bots.  We try to make these attack situations as realistic as possible by having the students dress as they might be dressed on the street going to work or coming from work.  We get this clothing as discards from thrift shops because the clothing often will get torn to shreds!  I can assure you they don’t always get to keep their clothing since the Rape-Bots are programmed to strip them if possible.”

Then my eyes were drawn to the six virtual fight training machines – all in a row down the middle of the gym.  For the most part they were open frames – each with multiple videocams and each defining an area about 8 ft by 12 ft in size.  Sue led me to a row of lockers standing near the VFTMs.  There was no privacy in the gym.  Even the showers were visible through clear plastic walls.  Sue’s boytoy Tomcat was a slender 20-something indentured servant.  He looked almost feminine and at the moment he was nude. He was working on repairing a realistic Rape-Bot, an android training device.

"Bill, grab a locker and put your clothes inside," Susan said as she removed her white terrycloth robe revealing she had nothing on underneath.  "Nudity is a weapon.  We train nude--mostly--because it gives us a tactical advantage.  Do you know how many women fall apart when their skirt is ripped from their bodies?  How many women will freeze up in terror when their rapist flashes a penis at them?  As you can see some of the men and women are dressed in various clothing like they'd wear on the street.  They will be assaulted by the Rape-Bot and have their clothing ripped from them.  They will be expected to disable their attackers and get away.  The final exercise will take place in a simulated bedroom."

I was embarrassed to be undressing in front of all these students.   I turned my back to the others as I undressed--it was too much to face the others as I stripped to my skin.  Finally, I was naked.  Unfortunately I had a partial erection.

"Bill, don't let little things bother you.  Come with me," Sue said.  "Class, this is Bill.  He's here to observe today's training.  Do not make fun of him--focus on your objective."

"Yes, Susan," the class replied.  

My face and ears were hot with embarrassment.  Just then, much to my chagrin, I saw Leroy and Tanisha approaching.  To be naked in front of these particular clothed people, after what I had witnessed yesterday, was a rather intense experience.  My partial soft erection was turning into a half hard erection as I stood there in front of my favorite bank teller. 

"Bill, wasn't it?" Leroy asked. Bill nodded "How does it feel to have the shoe on the other foot?  To be the naked one?"

"Leroy," Sue warned.

"Bill and I met before, at the Henderson clinic," Leroy said.  "Bill, I mean no impertinence, but if you could make that erection fully hard and maintain it hard for a while, I think it would be helpful for Tanisha’s therapy.  Could you humor us?"

"Please," Tanisha pleaded.  "I have to learn that an erection is an erection.”  

So, for Tanisha’s sake, and because I could hardly help myself anyway, I stroked my penis into full erection and stood there for a couple of minutes for Tanisha to take it all in.

“Stand down, Mr. Steelforth”, I heard at last from Sue, and found myself wilting.
 
"You are a slaver, right?"  I nodded in answer to Sue’s question.  "You use nudity to inflict learned helplessness on slaves.  Here I use nudity to inoculate my students against crippling embarrassment

"Bill, you want Stephanie to get this training," Sue continued.  "This has a very serious purpose.  When she completes the training she will have disarmed the nude bomb.  Neither her own nakedness nor the nakedness of an attacker will render her helpless.  She won't be shocked into immobility when a sexual predator flashes his naughty bits at her.  These people took command of their sexuality and nudity is no weapon against them.”

We have six virtual fight training machines.  I am continuously taking on new students.  I always have my newest batch experience fighting in the VFTMs before I have them fight my Rape-Bots.  Even my more advanced students refresh their skills in the VFTMs at some point each evening.  Since I have 24 students and only 6 machines I use a rotation system.”

“Can I watch one of these ‘virtual fights’?”

“That is just what I want you to do next.  Let’s go over and watch Vicki fight.”

As we walked over I noted that it must be rotation time.  Six very exhausted looking naked students, dripping with perspiration, were taking off their virtual helmets and stepping out of the fighting areas defined by the virtual frames. Six other naked students, looking fresh and eager, were donning these helmets.  We walked toward one of these students just before she put her helmet on.  I stole a quick furtive glance downward to satisfy myself that my penis had completely subsided.  Sue introduced me to Vicki, a slender blonde athletic type.  I shook hands with her and wished her a successful fight.  She smiled and excused herself to begin a sort of warm up dance before starting the fight.

“Before a student can experience a multi-sensory virtual fight”, she continued,  “he or she must have had a series of hypnotized sessions during the first week of the course in a simple audio-visual trainer.  Vicki has had this hypnotic training so that she will be able to experience certain physical sensations such as impact, loss of balance or pain when certain subliminal coded visual cues are flashed on her retinas.”

“Vicki will find herself sparring with a virtual partner, but Vicki’s own movements will be real and involve the full and conscious use of her own musculature.  Vicki will “see” the computer generated opponent through the virtual vision capability of the helmet, “hear” this opponent through the helmet, and actually experience blows from the opponent that she failed to block or sidestep.  She will experience the blow both as a force that she must counter-act with her own muscles to maintain balance, and also as a zone of pain on her own body – though there is no actual injury.  This computer controlled machine will train her to think fast and keep on fighting through the pain until she can deliver a blow that ends any threat posed by the virtual opponent.”

“But how will the machine know when or if she failed to evade or block a blow?”  I asked.

“The machine’s computer at all times knows”, she responded,  “the position, attitude and motions of the student’s body by integrating data from multiple video cameras.  It compares this data with the data it also has concerning the position, attitude and motions of the virtual opponent it has generated for the student.  But perhaps the best way to understand all this is to just watch.”

Vicki pushed the ‘Start’ button on one of the frame’s side posts.  Almost immediately we began to sense that there was an invisible ghost like presence in the same fighting area with Vicki.  We could see her begin to respond to this presence that only she could ‘see’.  All the muscles of her beautiful athletic body began to tense.  She assumed a fighting stance.  I could feel my penis begin to get partially erect again and hoped that Sue did not notice.  No such luck.  I could see Sue glance briefly downward at my crotch and I thought for a moment that she was going to say something but then she just smiled and encouraged me by a gesture to keep my focus on the fight.

Vicki began to dance around apparently trying to evade blows we could not see and look for an opening to counter punch.  We saw her duck suddenly and apparently avoid a blow that had been aimed at her head.  A moment later we saw her spring back and to one side suddenly as though she had taken a blow to her side.  At the same time we saw a facial grimace and observed her struggle with the muscles in her long slender legs to maintain her balance.  Soon we saw a red swelling appear on her left side just above the left kidney.  She appeared not to notice it or allow it to slow her down although it must have been painful.

“Here”, Sue offered, “Why don’t you slip on these virtual goggles?”

I did so and the picture was now complete.  I could see Vicki’s computer generated opponent quite clearly now.  He appeared male and I could also hear him breathing and occasional utterances.  I could judge how effective Vicki was in countering his blows and in finding an opening for counter attack.  It was apparent that she was favoring one side of her torso now, no doubt as a result of the painful blow she had sustained.  The virtual opponent was trying to get in a second punch in the area already in pain, but Vicki was too quick for him.  Sue whispered to me that the pain was only in her student’s mind and that there was no real injury in a virtual fight.  Vicki got in one particularly devastating blow to her opponent resulting in a loud bellow and a string of obscene words.  After that we noticed her opponent appeared tired and with sluggish reflexes.  The fight went on for some time until Vicki landed a knockout punch and the opponent slumped to the floor and remained motionless.  Vicki remained standing and we could see she was making a conscious effort to regulate her breathing.

“Vicki is using”, Sue explained, “a calming breathing technique to come down off her adrenal rush.  This is critical.  There is a backlash effect after combat, an anti-adrenalin effect that serves to bring the body back to normal rapidly.  It can get out of hand and stop your heart, but the breath control method teamed up with focus on something is an ancient bio-feedback method that returns one from the hyper condition of fighting back to a normal state without slowing the heart too rapidly.  Controlling the breathing can drive the pulse rate up or down and also regulate blood pressure.”

Once Vicki appeared to have returned to normal, Sue walked over and wrapped her arm around the shoulders of her student and praised her for a job well done.

“You have seen a virtual fight, now let me show you a real one.  I understand from Dr. Henderson that you already know Tanisha Williamson.”

“Yes, I had the pleasure of meeting her and her husband right after their therapy session yesterday”, I replied.

“Tonight is Tanisha’s graduation exercise in my program.  We have created a sort of movie set that simulates a dark deserted street not unlike that in which many women get raped.  Tanisha is going to re-enact a situation similar to the one in which she was originally raped.  Only this time she is going to react differently and have a different outcome.”

"Tanisha is a bank teller and is on her way home from work”, Sue explained.  “The bank requires professional attire from its tellers.   That means a business suit with high heels, nylons, blouse, jacket and a tight skirt for the women.  The bank doesn't want its employees, other than security staff, armed inside the bank during business hours.  To be legal the bank would have to provide its employees a way to check their weapons upon arrival for work, but most banks don’t want to be bothered with that.  It is technically against the law for an employer to demand that non-citizen employees leave their weapons at home, but non-citizens usually don't know the law.  Besides, they can be fired and there are two more to take their place.  So employees like Tanisha find that they must commute to and from work every day unarmed.”

Tanisha walked along the simulated street with confidence.  She had much experience with the mild everyday petty harassment that is a woman's lot in life.  She was carrying a bag of groceries she had just bought at the market 2 blocks away.  I was seeing the situation through Tanisha's eyes, but without her experience.    I was thankful that I had been born male!

I noticed that the clothes Tanisha wore simulated smart business attire, but on closer examination I could see the jacket and dress, though a good fit, were threadbare, the hose had a run, and the high-heeled shoes had seen better days.

“I have my student’s dress in clothing donated to my school by thrift shops.  It saves a lot of money when clothing is constantly getting ripped and destroyed in fights”, Sue explained.

Tanisha was skilled at walking in her high heels.  Even the bag of groceries did not slow her down or cause her to lose the bounce in her step.  The tight fitting dress didn't handicap Tanisha to the same degree it might have hobbled a woman not used to such attire. 

Soon she encountered a Rape-Bot that had been dressed like one of the street thugs I had seen outside earlier.   It shambled towards her bottle in one hand and the other was held out to her palm up.  I noticed a big pinkish penis that reminded me of Leroy Williamson's erect member--it was jutting out of the Rape-Bot’s open fly.  I could sympathize with Tanisha's aversion to cocks at the moment.  The Rape-Bot was operating at reduced speed and power.  "Brother," the mechanical thug slurred, "can you spare some change?"

I saw that Tanisha did not miss one of the pre-assault indicators.  The thug had glanced up and down the street to make sure he was alone with his intended victim.

“Watch Tanisha handle this situation", Sue whispered to me.

When the Rape-Bot shambled towards Tanisha, she loudly shouted, “Get the fuck away from me!”  in such a loud voice I thought the windows might shatter.

“Vocalizations are important”, Sue explained.  “Those vocalizations are also the mental triggers.  Shouting at the intruder to get lost triggered a killing rage in Tanisha that liberated all of her physical strength.  We humans have limiting software, if you will; mental conditioning that prevents us from hurting ourselves.  Have you heard of a mother lifting a car off her child?"

I nodded my head, unable to speak.

“The last thing we do”, Sue continued, “is a quick medical examination because when this limiting software is overridden, you can literally rip your muscles free.”

I saw that when Tanisha’s verbalization failed to stop the Rape-Bot’s advance, she hurled the bag of groceries forcefully right at the thug’s face, and while he was momentarily ducking that she sent one of her high heeled shoes flying like a projectile directly toward the thug’s crotch, stepped out of the other shoe and ripped the skirt off, wrapping it around her arm.  This left her naked from the waist down but for her nylon stockings. The Rape-Bot hesitated, then tossed his bottle at her forcefully as he charged.  Tanisha moved so fast that I had to watch the video replay later to see what she did.  Tanisha ducked and side-kicked his knee hard enough to buckle it.  She hit him several times with a palm strike and the edge of her hand and an elbow strike, and then she grabbed his arm and yanked it straight.  A loud crack was heard and a synthetic roar of pain as the Rape-Bot's elbow dislocated.  Tanisha whipped the torn skirt around its neck and slammed it face-first into the floor.  An instant later she was choking out the Rape-Bot with her skirt.  

I was in awe because she wore nothing other than a suit coat that was flapping open in front--the buttons had torn off in the fight.  With a broken arm and broken leg and the damage inflicted by Tanisha's uninhibited all-out assault, the Rape-Bot was no longer able to fight effectively.   One of its eyes had been ripped out--I watched the video three times at slow motion before I saw her stab a thumb into its eye socket.  The move was part of a sequence of moves and they all blended together. 

I saw Sue’s boytoy Tomcat drag the broken robot away to a repair area where it would have necessary parts replaced to restore it to operating condition for another student’s use.

“Was it really necessary”, I asked, “for Tanisha to launch such a brutal pre-emptive attack before the thug even made a move against her?”

“I am so glad you asked that question!” Sue replied.  “The only rule in a street fight is SURVIVE!  The attack victim will always be at a disadvantage because the attacker will be bigger and stronger and, at least in his own mind, meaner.  My students have only a few advantages--the main one being surprise and that they WILL pit their maximum strength against the attacker's weak points and will exploit every opening that the attacker affords.   I always stress with my students that this surprise is not to be squandered with gradualism because if the victim doesn't immediately kill or incapacitate her attacker, he may recover and use the superiorities he has.  I use Rape-Bots because I want realism and my students could hardly practice such brutal tactics against their fellow students“.

“But not every street assailant is intent on murder or rape”, I protested.  Some may only want to relieve their victim of a little money to buy their next bottle of booze.  Is it right to kill a man over that?”

“The victim of such an assailant”, Sue continued, “does not have the luxury of waiting to find out just how lethal her assailant might be.  She must assume the worst and use the advantages she has to render her assailant dead or unconscious.  Only when he is no longer a threat can she stop her assault.”

“Thank you”, I replied.  “You have answered my question.”

“Mr. Steelforth, please consider all that I have shown you tonight, discuss it with your female friend, and let Dr. Henderson and I know your decision.”

With that I returned to my locker, put my clothes back on, and found my way back out to the garage where my driver had remained waiting for me with the car.

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