Debt Camp

Gen-Alpha influencer John Magee is seized for sky-high debt, he’s thrust into Amazon’s punishing “Debt Camp,” where every flex is livestreamed, for a price he might never pay off.

  • Score 9.8 (4 votes)
  • 505 Readers
  • 4870 Words
  • 20 Min Read

Amazon’s Vacaville Fulfillment and Debt Camp


Welcome To Camp


An Hermes Motor's electric shuttle hissed and settled in the desert dust outside Amazon’s Vacaville Fulfillment and Debt Camp. Bronze Wallet handlers Cody and Zach marched their prize down the ramp: John Magee, his T‑shirt vacuum‑sealed tight across his chest.

Waiting on the hot pavement stood Warden Geoff #7 Bezos, the seventh legal clone of the world’s richest retiree. His half‑smile was surgical. A floating Fire tablet drone showed Bronze Wallet's assessment of John, like premium beef on an auction block: six‑foot‑two of obedient muscle, lifts whatever we order, debt eighteen grand and climbing.

“Fresh stock,” Warden Geoff #7 chirped. He flicked two fingers at John’s chest, a clear order to strip.

Handler Zach obediently slid his fingers beneath John Magee's vacuum‑tight hem and inched the cotton upward, the fabric skimming over his broad shoulders before slipping free and settling in the dust. Sunlight washed across his solid pecs and the sharply defined ridges of his abs. Thousands of Debt Camp streams buzzed with the same alert: NEW MUSCLE CAM—TAP TO WATCH.

Warden Geoff walked slow circles, the tablet’s scanner passing over the barcode printed below John’s right shoulder blade. “Primed and ready to work” he mused while tiny fireworks burst on the screen. “You’ll pull more eyeballs than our entire roster.”

John swallowed hard. Pride twisted into dread.

“Welcome to Vacaville,” Geoff said, turning toward the open warehouse where camera booms waited like hungry jaws. “Time to earn your keep.”

John followed the directions toward the locker room, feeling a million strangers counting each step of his freedom.


Fit Check · February 2029


Inside, lenses tracked John like hungry eyes.

Warden Geoff #7 Bezos ordered debt camper John Magee to strip off the rest of the civilian clothing and shower. "You got nothing to be modest about, boy. But for your benefit, your cock and balls will always be blurred on stream."

John was grateful to hear about his streaming privacy, but that did not ease his discomfort showering exposed in front of a man in person, even if that man is a clone.

Geoff #7 collared John, who was dressed only in a wrapped towel, with a GPS choker and then demonstrated to the hunk how to insert the HUD ledger contacts. The warden cracked open a black pouch just wide enough for John’s thick fingers to reach in and tossed it at John's athletic jock body.

John fished out the gear piece by piece while the live chat held its breath. He took the charcoal shorts first. The hunk bent low, strong back rolling under the warehouse light, and stepped in the skintight shorts. Stretch fabric crawled over hamstrings that looked cast in steel, then hugged the sharp angle where oblique met hip. Comments spiked: heat‑wave emojis, tip storms, a string of “lower the camera.”

Next came the kneepads. John rolled each sleeve of black neoprene up thunderous quads, the rubber squeezing over every carved ridge until it hugged the full sweep of thigh. The chat went feral, tipping every time the fabric inched higher. Geoff #7, lounging like a club MC, murmured, “Budget line: orthopedic savings,” triggering a rain of applause emojis. Heat bloomed across John’s cheeks, a glow that cameras captured in delicious 4K.

Finally he lifted the boots. He worked the laces, calves tightened at each tug. Rising to full height, his chest puffed forward, shoulders rolling back in a roll that sent a frenzy through the feed.

John angled his chin toward the nearest lens, a smirk tugging at one corner of his mouth. “Hope your tip fingers are warmed up,” he drawled, popping each pec in turn like a backstage muscle show. “This prime cut just hit the menu.”

Geoff tapped a button. A bright grid floated over John’s body—like a virtual yard sale. Every major muscle lit up in lime or pink. A notification popped up on advertising managers’ phones: ASSET ONLINE—CHOOSE YOUR SLOT.

Bidders raced to claim space:

  • Back Slot: Hermes Motor claimed the space. Every time John’s wide back rippled, sleek autonomous vans zipped across screens.
  • Right Pec Slot: ApolloBioTech locked in the territory; a glowing DNA strand swelled with each heartbeat.
  • Ab Panel 3 of 8: An Orange County crypto tag pulsed a QR code whenever his core clenched.

“Deep inhale, big boy,” Geoff coaxed, voice smooth as dark liquor. “Sponsors get hot watching the ride.”

John filled his lungs, chest billowing then deflating like a slow tide. The QR tag over Ab Panel 3 flashed fever‑red.

Geoff wrapped a tape around John’s bulging arm. “Seventeen and a half inches. We’ll grow it to eighteen by barbecue season,” he told the chat. Laugh emojis spilled down the screen. John forced a grin. Two years ago he’d voted for less regulation; now that free market wrapped around his biceps like a handcuff.

Geoff turned him in a lazy circle. Spotlights skimmed taut glutes and hard quads under thin fabric, then slid over calves cut like stone. Every pause triggered a fresh bid.

Geoff patted John’s bicep. “Asset’s ready. Let’s get to work.”

Boots thudded as John felt every jiggle of his pecs and bounce of arms paying someone else’s mortgage


Get To Work


A brass siren tore through the warehouse bay. Roll‑up doors groaned open and heat lamps snapped alive, painting the floor in showtime orange. Every lens locked onto John, waiting for the first sparkle of sweat to travel the ladder of his eight‑pack.

Morning Rush

Task board flashed: move two hundred battery cores to Bay 4, rebuild pallet walls in Bay 7.

John scooped the first battery, nearly two hundred pounds of dead weight. Veins surfaced along his forearms, pecs bunching under the strain. Chat ignited with rockets and “MAGA MEAT” loops.

Conveyor Sprint

“Race the belt,” Warden Geoff #7 barked.

John rolled his neck, tossing a grin over one broad shoulder. “Try to keep up, boss,” he called, voice smooth and cocky. "I don’t slow down for machinery." John surged beside Conveyor A, thighs pumping, calves snapping under tight shorts. Digital confetti streamed through feeds though real air smelled like burning plastic. Fans debated whether his lung power out‑pulled a turbo charger.

At noon the leaderboard crowned John Magee third in the western camps, undisputed ruler of Pec Cam.

Brawn Assist

A sorting drone froze mid‑rail. “Brawn assist!” Geoff #7’s order echoed. John crouched beneath the stalled machine, corded back straining. Three robotic eyes zoomed close as he pressed the metal husk skyward.

The Warden thumped streamer Theo Vaughn's PROPERTY RIGHTS sticker at the base of John’s spine. “Cheaper than a wrench, champ!” The joke echoed across every feed.

John forced a sharp bark of laughter, pecs twitching the ApolloBioTech decal, while a sour taste filled his mouth. Viewer minutes spiked with each flex of muscle.

Tally

The shift finally ended. John tugged off his sweaty kneepads, the neoprene slid over trembling thighs, leg muscles fluttering like idling engines. His calves jerked, and his chest rose and fell in slow, heavy breaths. The ledger flared neon against the gloom:

Tips $128.60 | Sponsor Totals $136.40 | Debt + $7.80

Communal Rinse

A tinny bell sent crews toward the showers. John stepped beneath lukewarm spray, steam feathering over swollen traps and the long slope of his back. Overhead cams rotated for a “rinse cam” bonus.

Water snaked along twin ridges of pec, dipped between bricks of his stomach. Viewers tipped each time suds traced the deep cut adonis belt. John turned, wide shoulders blocking three lanes of shower tile. When he bent to scrub calves like flexed springs, chat windows erupted in fire emojis. A new surcharge blinked in his HUD: Water Usage $1.25/min.

John felt no lighter afterward. He grabbed a towel, rubbed himself down, and winced when the cold air hit his damp skin. Sponsor logos re‑appeared the instant his HUD re‑synced: back slot, pec slot, ab panel—still rented, still earning debt credits.

Lights Out

The hunk climbed onto the thin bunk, muttering that the pain still burned while the shackles felt even tighter. The overhead lamps blinked off, leaving a single red standby bulb glowing. It seemed to wait for him to roll onto his back so the the audience could admire his pecs while he slept.

Cafeteria

Every meal line snaked beneath a framed copy of Luigi v. Washington, the high‑court blessing that cemented the Libertarian Recovery Act of 2028 and turned hunger and debt into profitable roommates. As workers shuffled forward, automated dispensers slopped trays with pale protein mash laced with "growth enhancers," unlabeled pills that fizzed when dropped into the mix. Management called them "muscle multipliers," a silent promise that John’s biceps would hit Geoff’s eighteen‑inch quota, side effects be cursed. Overhead, gilded letters glowed with Justice Lindsay Graeme’s quote: “Debt is just an unfinished handshake.”

John passed the plaque each shift, jaw locked. On day three he bumped shoulders with Leon Matthis, a lean former HVAC tech whose student loans tripled after a wildfire melted his work van. Leon slid half a tasteless protein bar his way and called the ruling “the most expensive motivational poster in America.”

Friendship sparked in cafeteria lines and on the warehouse dock. Leon tossed boxes while John balanced heavy batteries on one palm for the cameras. They swapped dark jokes about “pay‑per‑view poverty,” raced push‑up totals before the lunch whistle, and compared tiny tip payouts like baseball cards. In the clang of steel and barcode beeps, John found something the camp couldn’t sell: a friend.


Justice Lindsay Graeme · August 2029


Six months in, heat shimmered over the loading bays. A swarm of news drones buzzed overhead. In their middle walked Justice Lindsay Graeme, accompanied by Warden Geoff #7 Bezos.

Justice Graeme stopped on a catwalk, looking down at the living billboard, debt camper Magee.

“Strong specimen,” Graeme cooed, drawl dripping sweet tea and judgment. “Lift me, sweetheart. Show off your healthy American body, sculpted by the patriotic debt camp program."

John swallowed a pinch of revulsion, wasn’t this the straight‑arrow conservative he’d championed in debate class at Roseland Charter?

The high-profile debt relief won out. “Brace yourself, Your Honor,” John murmured, more cocky than kind, and swept Graeme’s frame upward. Pride flared across the hunk's chest even as the judge’s cologne, oak barrel and bank vault, filled his lungs and left an uneasy heat under his skin. Cameras snapped like fireworks. The justice's trousers rode up just enough for viewers to glimpse pale calf brushing the sculpted rise of John’s obliques. Peach emojis spilled down the stream, followed by wink faces and the tag #LadyGRidesAgain.

A reporter shouted, “Does involuntary labor match constitutional liberty?” Graeme’s fingertips grazed the neon Apollo helix strobing over John’s right pec, almost a caress. “Liberty?” He laughed. “Nothing freer than a market that can rent abs by the inch.” Stock tickers leapt as if on cue.

“Higher, darling, show them you’re liberty‑strong.” John pressed him skyward, traps bunching, chest plates lifting like piston heads.

Photographers moved on, but Graeme wasn’t finished. He led John into a narrow service hallway that was restricted from streaming. “For my private cloud,” he hummed, handing Warden Geoff a phone already recording. John braced and strict‑pressed the judge overhead, arms trembling under the sudden hush. Graeme’s loafers drummed a patter across John’s ab plates before the judge slid down, pressing chest to chest.

"Another two-hundred fifty dollars to let me suck that long hard cock of yours," the Justice bargained.

Although John was disgusted, the camper concluded it was an easy way to bring his ledger down. John lowered his uniform shorts an whipped out his long cock. John primed his cock hard after seeing the disapproving look at his flaccid member.

The Conservative Justice's cum-gobbling skills surprised John, as the old man slurped John's dick with the finesse of someone who's sucked many cocks before.

After wiping the hunk's cum from his face with his Italian handkerchief, Justice Graeme’s slid John's shorts back up the tree-trunk legs and lingered on the waistband. As the trio returned from the corridor, the John's stream came back online and viewers noticed a gavel resting against the carved V of John’s hips. John’s cheeks flamed, realizing his own body now hawked judicial sponsorship.

“Bless your patriot heart,” Graeme whispered, lips a breath from John’s ear. “You voted for strong markets. Now watch them work.” With a final pat to the broad curve of John’s pec, the Justice sashayed back to the cameras.

On the dock the playback screens looped John’s sweat‑sheened chest lifting the judicial figure. News anchors dubbed it “concurring opinion on lifting form". Graeme’s investment account spiked on word of a limited‑edition “Justice Lifted” NFT.


Year 2 · March 2030


The second year began. Breakfast continuing with muscle multiplier mash, and months of hauling drone parts forged results: John Magee's arms swelled past the promised eighteen inches, traps towered like twin ridges, even the deep channel between his pecs grew wider. Viewers logged on just to measure the added thickness each week, while the hunk felt every new centimeter tighten the chains of debt he had voted for.

Motivational posters showed John’s face beside slogans about accountability. He lifted, carried, loaded, each rep broadcasting to devices worldwide. Subscribers loved the redemption arc; sponsors adored the sweat. Bronze Wallet trimmed his debt with every view. MAGA streamer Matt Walsh called it proof that the system worked.

A live ticker glowed faintly in his HUD: Debt → 14,412 USD. Each time his chest expanded under strain, the digits quivered and dropped a few cents, enough to spark a flicker of hope, fifteen bucks shaved off by mid-shift, twenty by the time break ended. Maybe, if the supplements kept roaring and the tips kept flowing, zero wasn’t a fantasy after all. He doubled down on the flex, feeling veins swell like live wires, and the chat split down party lines, half drowning him in drooling heart‑eyes, half spitting “juice‑head” slurs and side‑by‑side gifs predicting his organs would tap out before his balance.

Once the bay lamps blinked off, John would murmur across the aisle to Leon, their voices threading through the dark as they swapped gallows jokes and compared the day’s bleeding ledger totals. Early on, John confessed he’d pegged the Bronze Wallet handlers, Cody and Zach, as a gay couple assessing his physique, but finding out they were identical twins unsettled him even more.

Leon’s wheezy laugh had echoed off the concrete walls. His sly grin worked like a pressure valve. He’d riff on the flavor notes of "muscle multipliers" while John, still wet from shower cam, curled an arm overhead and let the swollen biceps peak draw a low whistle from his friend. They declared a private contest, whoever shaved the most dollars off his balance each week won the other’s last protein bar. John pushed harder, not for the chat this time but for Leon’s conspiratorial clap on the shoulder at shift change.

One humid afternoon Leon slid him a contraband chalk cube so his grip wouldn’t slip on the freight crates. The white dust puffed across John’s thick forearms. The cameras caught the dust's sparkle and viewers showered tips; forty dollars evaporated from the ticker in a single lift. Across Bay 4, Leon answered John’s silent mouthed thanks with a wink that felt brighter than the warehouse floodlights.


B. Duddy · May 2030


B. Duddy, once king of late‑’90s radio and recently pardoned by Third Term President Trump for a raft of hush‑money payoffs that allegedly kept his boy‑toy entourage off the tabloids. Now he styled himself a "venture prophet." Cameras swooned when he swaggered onto the debt camp warehouse dock in mirrored shades, diamond grill flashing a grin the size of a stimulus check.

Staff airbrushed Duddy's logo, across John’s boulder shoulders, the latex paint wet and shiny.

Disgust burned in his gut. He’d actually applauded Trump’s pardon, imagining Duddy as another board‑room hustler, not a guy who’d be tap‑dancing on his lats for clicks. The setup felt too intimate, too showy, nothing he’d ever signed up for. Even so, the promise of shaved debt and the thrill of an audience still tugged louder than caution. If the debt camp streamers wanted a spectacle, he’d flex until the walls shook.

“Kneel, brand stand,” a producer barked. John dropped to all fours, forcing a smirk over his shoulder. “You wanted prime grade? Marbling’s on display, boys.” Duddy planted patent‑leather sneakers on the shelf of John’s back, treating him like a VIP riser while a thunder of bass rolled through the warehouse.

The single, Debt Flex, blasted over speakers. Strobe lights skated across John’s traps, each flash making lat planes pop like gunpowder. ApolloBioTech timed discount codes to pulse across Chest Cam whenever Duddy shouted "profit." Chat exploded with flame emojis and thirsty comments about "that credit‑crushing core."

Mid‑song Duddy crowed, "Turn a broke bitch into Bitcoin," and slapped John’s muscular ass for emphasis. On cue John surged upright, pressing the rapper overhead like a chrome kettlebell. Biceps ballooned, forearms latticed with blue cords, eight‑brick abs cinched tight. The tips clinked like falling quarters.

“Cut,” a producer barked. Duddy slid off the slick incline of John’s upper body, smoke curling from the cigar gripped between diamond teeth. “Furniture never came this premium,” he buzzed, letting a ribbon of haze drift along the deep ravine between chest plates.

Stagehands rolled in a neon throne. Duddy flicked ash and sneered “Acrylic cracks. I prefer living hardwood.” He stamped a sneaker onto Justice Graeme's gavel hovering just above the V-line of John’s hips. In seconds Human Ottoman #001 gifs flooded social feeds.

Duddy leaned in close to John. “Private encore," the rapper ordered.


John stormed off set through the service corridor, with B. Duddy stalking him like prey. Violet bulbs humming overhead, John twisted his neck and barked at the hovering producer drone, “Show’s over. Get this clown off my back.” The drones swept closer instead. He cursed under his breath but kept walking when his HUD displayed an offer; three hundred dollars off the ledger if he played along. John could almost taste those digits dissolving.

For the first time all shift the roar of drones receded. Duddy shut down the hallway feeds with a tap, then snapped at the hunk, “Floor.”

John let his palms kiss concrete. Wide lats fanned beneath skin hot from the stage lights while chilly air raised pinpricks along the corded ridge of his back. He felt the rapper settle astride him, a familiar pressure that flattened the heat between his shoulder blades. The ledger in his HUD began counting backward in five‑dollar increments. John inhaled slow. Each breath spread the sloping mass of his chest, earning a metallic chime in his ear and shaving another slice from the debt.

Duddy’s phone lit the barcode under John’s scapula. “Look at that product ID glow.” Fingertips traced the black lattice, sending a shiver down John’s spine. It was humiliating, yet profitable. Pride had to wait; subtraction felt better than resistance.

“Flex.”

John obeyed. Traps bunched like cables winding on a winch. His torso rose with the rapper perched above, pecs swelling, abs locking into a stone staircase. Sweat pearled at the base of John's neck, slid along the valley between muscle hills, and vanished into debt camper shorts. Five more dollars off.

"Down Stallion and lie down," B. Duddy commanded. The rapper removed his designer jeans and straddled John Magee's thick neck. "These tiddies gon take my dick," the rapper purred.

Duddy grasped the pointed ends of John's thick pecs and guided his pardoned dick into the chest groove. John gasped and moaned as his nipples were being yanked by the celebrity pardoned criminal.

"Shut the fuck up mothafucka and eat my ass," Duddy screamed as he reclined on to John's resisting lips. "Open up and lick," the rapper ordered. Duddy switched up the strategy on the broke bitch and started tenderly flicking John's nipples rather than squeezing them. Duddy was rewarded by the debt camper complying and tenderly licking the rapper's bud.

Duddy began thrusting into John's pec-pussy and out of generosity moved one hand to jack John's long hard cock while keeping the other on John's right nipple. The mogul and the debtor's orgasms synced and they both shot their load over John's muscular torso. Duddy slid off with a satisfied grunt, cigar ember painting sparks over the gleaming cum across John’s pecs and abs.

Duddy redressed in his designer jeans and strutted back into the warehouse. “You’re cheaper than hush money,” he laughed. John bit back a retort. The hunk limped to the showers to wash both men's loads off.

As John climbed into his bunk he told himself this was just another set. Three hundred down.


Camp Royalty · July 2030


By high summer John was camp royalty. Dawn broadcasts opened on his silhouette, a living skyscraper flexing against pink desert sky, then cut to the weigh‑in scale where supervisors chanted data like sports commentators. Body fat scraped single digits.

Every shift he shattered another absurd benchmark. Tuesday he shoulder‑pressed a 540‑pound drone engine twenty‑nine reps, ticker shaving eight bucks from the ledger. Thursday he turned pallet stacking into burlesque, hips rolling as he slammed box one thousand and earned the week’s “sweat dividend,” a five‑cent bonus per bead of perspiration. Even so the red counter blinked 9,784 USD. Progress, but every drop of muscle seemed to lengthen the leash.

The growth was freakish. Traps climbed his neck like rising escarpments, delts domed beneath skin polished by heat lamps. Veins etched new roadmaps across his forearms and split the granite spread of pecs with a pulsing groove. The chat lost its mind at lunch when he sat, adonis belt sharply carved, thighs bulking so wide the metal bench groaned.

John flexed an arm, watching the peak swell. Conceit warmed his grin, yet a quiet truth followed: Cody and Zach were right, the camp diet had forged him into something monstrous and marketable. Viewers spammed peach and fire icons while sponsors fought over bicep real estate now stretched to nineteen inches.

However, humiliation lurked in camera tricks. Drones forced “freeze‑pumps,” hovering until he held a pose beyond burning point, cramps kicking under steel‑taut quads while overlays hawked discount codes across trembling muscle. Old high‑school buddies in chat threw up split‑screens, svelte lean teen quarterback then, action figure now. Every jeer shaved pennies off his debt, yet the laughter stung more than any rep.

That night, sweat still tacky on swollen lats, John sat on the edge of his bunk. In the shadowed aisle Leon eased up beside him, glancing at ceiling cams on standby.

“Quarterly audit,” he breathed. “They kill power eight minutes to swap servers. No drones. No collars ping.” He unfolded a scrap torn from a packing invoice: AUG 30 – 02:05 A.M.

John’s chest pumped, the trench between pecs deepening. He pictured the fence line. Yet Leon’s face, thin & frantic, pressed closer than the fantasy of freedom.

“How many minutes have you bought off?” John asked.

“Barely a grand in sixteen months,” Leon replied. “At this rate I’ll die here.”

John blew out a breath. “You think I’m winning? Judge Graeme rode me like a county‑fair pony, Duddy used me as a throne. Top performer, sure, but every flex sells another piece of me.” His voice cracked, shockingly human. “I can’t rinse the stink of it off.”

Leon’s eyes widened. “Then you have to run.”

John clapped Leon’s back, one heavy smack that nearly lifted the smaller man. “We both get out,” he whispered, feeling the weight of another man’s hope sink into shoulders already aching from sponsored strain.

Leon’s grin flashed, a spark in the dark. They bumped fists, John’s dwarfing Leon’s like a baseball mitt. For a breath they just sat, side by side, until the monitors crackled alive again with the next data sync.


Audit Night · August 2030


At 2:07 a.m. the grid died, plunging Amazon’s Vacaville Fulfillment and Debt Camp into the dark. John Magee’s HUD fell blank. No ads, no tips, just the bass‑drum pound of blood in his ears. Across the shadowed aisle Leon Matthis whispered, “Now.”

They sprinted, one hulking, one wiry. John’s strides pounded the warehouse pavement, his wide back pale under the moonglow skylights. Leon darted ahead between crate stacks. Each leap forced John’s chest to swell, hot air scraping his lungs.

A loading bay door gaped. Cool desert wind swept across John's swollen torso, skimming the burning channel between pecs, licking the razor V of his hips. Freedom tasted sharp as citrus on his tongue.

Leon darted ahead through the exit. John lost him in the dark maze of crates. Panic flickered—where had Leon gone? John burst through the threshold, boots crunching open‑yard gravel as the chain‑link perimeter glimmered fifty yards ahead. For an instant the night smelled of sweet desert dust and freedom, cool wind drying the sweat that slicked his shoulders. Alarms shrieked, red strobes carved the night sky. A volley of spotlights erupted, pinning the fleeing hulk in a glare that turned the desert dust to blinding snow.

A carbon‑fiber net laced with live current blasted from an overhead rail, billowing mid‑air before cocooning John's torso. Voltage snapped across his skin; pecs seized into granite, abs welded into a solid plate, and two hundred forty pounds of living billboard crashed to gravel.

The HUD blinked awake: Resistance Surcharge $2.00/min – Tip War Active. Viewers poured coins to see the behemoth twitch.

John’s roar thundered through the pallet aisles. At Warden Geoff’s curt nod, two guards jabbed stun rods into the taper of the hunk's waist. The warden himself stepped in, steel‑toe driving into John’s ribs, the Apollo helix quivering across bruised chest. A guard yanked the debt camper's wrists behind the broad shelf of his back, clamp cuffs biting until veins bulged against hard plastic. Shackles snapped around bull calves and a spreader bar forced his stance wide, displaying every swollen inch for the exploding chat.

A crane arm dropped from a nearby forklift. Nylon slings hissed around wrists, jerked him skyward in a single savage haul. Chest stretched like heated plate glass, lats flared, current still fizzing along his skin while viewers tallied every twitch, the fine driving higher.

Warden Geoff’s guards secured John spread-eagle on the forklift’s forks. Winches screeched, drawing limbs toward the corners until shoulders popped. Floodlights feasted on ropey veins crawling his arms, on quivering quads pressed to the cold metal, on the stubborn arch of his back. Tip meters burst as viewers hurled coin icons, a frantic bid to blunt the penalty, but new fees poured in twice as fast, turning the ledger a deeper crimson.

Leon stepped into the spotlight flanked by guards, the fresh CO‑OPERATOR PRIORITY badge at his throat flashing like a predator’s grin. John’s gaze dropped to the Fire wrist‑tablet on Leon’s arm-- $2,000 CLEARED--and the sight hollowed him behind all that armor of muscle. The friend who once slipped him chalk had bought freedom with John’s flesh. The forklift’s idle rumble smothered whatever apology quivered on Leon’s lips. Grief punched beneath John’s sternum, rage followed, rolling through broad shoulders as he strained against the cuffs.

Geoff lifted a hand. “Kill feeds.” Screens worldwide blinked black. John’s HUD, however, burned crimson; ad revenue vanished, yet the surcharge ticked on. Each unseen second bloated the balance like rot. The tally flickered: Debt → 10,945 USD and climbing.

The forklift jerked forward. A cutting breeze slid over the hunk's exposed mass, tracing the cleft between chest slabs. Leon’s small figure faded behind racks, guilt knotting his face.

Strapped wide, watching debt climb anew, John understood the program’s last cruelty: humiliation had value only when broadcast. Now it was his private burden to carry.


NeuroLoop


Influencers gushed over Camp Vacaville’s “efficiency.” Justice Graeme posted a smug thumbs‑up selfie. B. Duddy dropped a new remix that looped John Magee’s wounded gasp over trap drums. Brands lined up to claim every bruise flowering across the still‑pumped acreage of his body.

The forklift rolled into the clinic bay and clicked to a halt, lowering the carceral prongs. A nurse in sterile whites swabbed antiseptic across the ripped cap of John’s shoulder. Each swipe jolted the high slope of his back, muscle twitching like struck cable.

Warden Geoff breezed in with two techs wheeling a chrome case. He snapped the lid, revealing a silver neural hoop webbed with sensors.

“Attitude tune‑up,” Geoff #7 said, gaze sliding along John’s welted pecs. “Calibration begins at dawn.”

Two guards tightened the leather straps pinning him spread across the steel forks. Lats bulged against the restraints. His chest lifted in short, angry breaths. A digital timer appeared on the clinic wall: 23 h 59 m 30 s.

A tech lowered the hoop toward his temples. Static prickled shaved stubble along his scalp. Inside John’s visor new numbers bloomed red: setup fee, cranial bandwidth, bio‑telemetry surcharge; each one stacking atop the debt column like bricks sealing a tomb.

The clone leaned close, fingers drumming the firm peak of John’s right bicep as if testing a melon. “Tomorrow we stream again in 4K.” Warden Geoff #7 Bezos smirked, then strode out.

Lights dimmed to a weak amber. Drones drifted back to the warehouse. Silence settled, broken only by the slow grind of John’s teeth. A chill crept over his exposed torso. He flexed, testing the bindings, bands of muscle rippling under bruised skin. The straps held.

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