Juvenalas Penitatas
Lesson 21 – The Visitor

When Talek and Rilka were asked if they'd like to do a good deed for a kindern going down the wrong path both were immediately suspicious to the point of fearing for their hides. They were familiar with the Penny Placement Program, Talek having done it himself years ago, but the idea of participating in it themselves caught them completely off-guard.
“I thought kindern were only sent to stay with Soft Timers,” Rilka said in protest.
“Normally, yes; but in this case it's an older boy, and we think spending a little time with Talek might be just what he needs.”
Shon's answer, vague as it was, painted a vivid picture in Talek's mind. The green-scaled Karrian boy glanced down at the letters on the back of his paws, the 'JP' he had earned himself through teenage stupidity. “He's like me, isn't he? He's on the verge of being a juvenalas penitatas?”
His father nodded. “The boy's made a lot of mistakes. He's fallen in with the wrong crowd from what we're told; the Albaqa Judiciary believe that a short stay in Northrock might be just what he needs to turn his life around.”
“Wait, he's from Albaqa? Don't they have their own Penny Towns?”
“Only about thirty million people actually live on that planet, Rilka; and it is our closest neighbour - only a few hours via shuttle. Its hardly difficult for them to send their convicts our way!”
“Do we know what he's done to earn this?” Talek asked cautiously.
“No, and we'll extend him the same right to privacy you both enjoy.” Both Pennys understood the implied warning, even though it was delivered softly.
Talek gave his paws another cautious glance. “I guess... I should try to make sure nobody else has to wear these.”
His mumbled words made Shon grin with pride. “I knew you'd be on board. Rilka?”
The cream-scaled girl let out a low whine. “We're both going to get a bunch of extra punishments, aren't we?”
“Unfortunately, yes,” Shon at least tried to sound sympathetic. “He'll need to see what Penny life is like. There'll be no censorship; he'll see and hear everything. I know neither one of you wants to get punished more than absolutely necessary, so don't think we won't be grateful for you sacrificing your comfort to do this.”
Rilka raised her claws in surrender, though she kept her snout downturned. “Fine! But when this is over I want a whole day in front of the holo to make up for it!”
Shon chuckled at the demand, “maybe not a whole day, but I'm sure holo-time can be arranged. Well, since you're both now on-board we should get ready.”
“Oh come on!” Rilka blurted out, catching something in her father's tone that Talek completely missed. “You decided to take him in before asking us!”
“We didn't need your permission, Rilka,” Shon's tone had lost all sympathy now.
The girl glanced to Talek, as if looking for him to back her up in her resentment. In truth, he too felt cheated by having the choice be no choice at all, but he certainly wasn't going to say as much! With no other option available, the girl shyly reached for the strings of her trouser waistband and unfastened them, letting pants and underwear fall to her ankles. She then lifted off her shirt, dropping it to the ground as she shook her ankles free of the garments. “Where do you want me?” she asked softly.
“I wasn't planning on spanking you,” Shon answered. “But since you're in bare scale you can stay that way. A little humiliation might keep your tongue still.” Rilka blushed at the sentence, but Talek suspected by the subtle wiggle in her stance that she was happy to be 'punished' this way.

Their new house guest arrived less than an hour later, in a place and fashion familiar to all involved. The hovercar's repulsion systems eased it down onto the beach, the anti-grav bubble kicking up a billowing sheet of sand once it was around four feet off the ground. The passengers inside waited until the cloud had settled before opening the doors and escorting a male teenager out to the waiting family. He looked around fifteen or sixteen, with dark brown scales flecked with green; colourings that made Talek think of tree bark. His caramel hair, by quirk of genetics or fashion choice, was restricted to a thin streak across the middle of his head and grown long into a ponytail.
Liki took a step forward to greet him. “Dale, isn't it? I'm Liki. This is my husband, Shon, and our two charges, Talek and Rilka. We'll be your family during your stay.”
Dale's gaze was at eye-level with the rejuves, though due to his slumping posture this was likely by accident. His eyes bounced off of Talek as though he were unworthy of attention, but lingered on Rilka for longer. They also lingered lower, then hastily went elsewhere in search of something to focus on.
“Did you have a nice trip, Dale?” Shon asked in a parental tone that would set off warning klaxons in the heads of any experienced Penny. Dale merely shrugged.
After a pause that lasted far too long, Liki waved towards the house. “Well, perhaps we can get to know each other better when you've had a chance to settle in. Where I in your place I'd be feeling quite anxious right now.”
“Sure.” Dale's eyes kept coming back to, then glancing off the pair of penitatas. He fell in behind the Dafrons, claws firmly in his pockets.
Rilka dared to lean into Talek and whisper, “bet you he'll freak when he sees the bathroom!”
“Obviously! Everyone freaks when they see that!” Talek hissed back. His eyes flickered up to his parents, wondering if they'd overheard. Neither looked around, but Talek felt sure they were both smiling.
Shon and Liki wasted no time in leading the teenager upstairs. “You'll be staying in the Penny Room,” Shon said as they reached the curved landing, his claw gesturing to the windowed inner wall. “We've put a camping mattress down for you, and I'll fetch the bedding down shortly.”
As predicted, Dale's eyes fixed on the open-plan bathroom space. “What is that?”
“I've been to Albaqa, Dale; your toilets, sinks and bathtubs are the same as ours,” Shon replied, clearly enjoying himself.
“Why is it in the open?” he snapped back.
“Because privacy is a privilege, not a right,” Liki countered smartly.
“I'm not having you stare at me when I'm taking a shit!” Dale growled, squaring off against the adults.
The grin on Shon's features crystalised. “Where do you think you are, Dale?” he asked softly, his words slipping out like a blade from a sheath.
“I think I'm in some fucked up pervert's house!” Dale rolled his shoulders as if readying to swing a punch. Liki glanced to the two nine-year-old Pennies and subtly waved for them to back off. Both crept down the stairs a little, but stayed close enough to watch the confrontation unfold.
“We don't like it when penitatas swear, Dale, and make no mistake that you are a penitatas while under our roof. I had hoped we could ease you in gently, but it seems you want to make an issue of things. That's fine by me.”
“You're full of shit!” Dale barked back. “I'm a kindern, not a Penny! I know my rights!”
“Do you have any idea how many times we've heard those words, Dale? You have no idea the kind of misery you've earned for yourself by running your mouth just then. Everything you do from here on out is only going to dig yourself deeper.” Shon stepped closer, mirroring Dale's aggressive posture. “Swing at me, Dale. Go on! See where it gets you!”
For a moment, Talek thought the boy would throw a punch at Shon, but instead he shouted into the adult's face, “I'm leaving!” and turned sharply towards the stairs. Shon grabbed him, and then the punch came. Both rejuves cried out in shock as their father leaned backward, the boy's fist skimming past his snout by the narrowest of margins, only to suddenly, violently yank the teen off-balance and swing him bodily into the windowed wall with a tremendous bang. Dale didn't even cry out, and before he could regain his senses, Shon was pinning him in place.
“That was an incredibly stupid decision!” Shon snarled, forcing the boy's arm up against his back.
“Let go! You're hurting me!”
“Not yet we aren't! But we're about to, just you wait!”
Talek and Rilka were left stunned as Dale was wrestled into their bedroom and forced kicking and screaming towards the bed where he was bent over. Shon pinned him down and held him there, while Liki turned her attention to their charges.
“Are you two okay?” she asked, softly stroking each child's snout.
“I've never seen dad act like that,” Rilka whispered. Liki pressed against her cheek to shift her focus.
“You both know how harsh punishments can be. Our guest here needs an extra harsh one! Just stay out of the way, alright? If it gets too much, you can head downstairs.” She then headed up to wherever they kept the full suite of disciplinary tools, emerging with a paddle that sent shivers of purest dread down the spine of both Pennys – a blistering paddle. It looked quite old, and was certainly larger than any they'd felt in their time in the home.
Despite the boy's struggles, Liki was able to wrestle his pants down. She gave no warning that the spanking was coming; Shon grabbed the boy's tail and yanked it up, and the paddle came down with a thunderclap. Dale roared with fury, redoubling his efforts to break free, but he had a full-grown adult crushing him into the bed. He wasn't going anywhere, and he had no escape.
The loud, heavy, thudding claps of the blistering paddle against the teen's brown-green scale rang out over and over. He held his composure for a time, but with each swing his shouts and barks became more desperate, more pained, until he was sobbing just like any other child in Northrock would. Talek and Rilka both knew their mother was holding nothing back, for she let out a grunt of effort with each swing that slapped hard into the youth's rear. The holes in the paddle deformed the soft scales of his rear, straining and cracking the seams. The harsh friction of the heavy wooden board did its cruel work well; soon enough, as Liki lifted the paddle from the boy's bruised, reddened rear, there were clear mounds forming where scales had begun to separate, leaving stinging fluid blisters beneath. Talek flinched as he saw the paddle's face slap across an especially large blister, bursting it as soon as it had formed with an appropriately mortified scream echoing from Dale's maw.
When the torment ceased and Liki stepped away, she had to pause to wipe the sweat from her brow. Her efforts had left the boy's backside an ugly mess of reds, purples and yellows, each mark corresponding to a different form of pain and suffering. “We'll have to clean him up a little,” she announced, heading back upstairs to return with a large diaper. Dale simply wailed into the bedsheets, his crying once more breaking into shrieks once Liki pressed the garment against his rear.
“A few of your blisters popped. We don't want you dripping,” Shon told him, holding the youth's tail up and away as Liki fastened the diaper in place, then locked it to the lad with a harness. “Don't go thinking you'll get any nano-lotion either, mister! When you are a penitatas your backside has to heal the old fashioned way!”
Finally freed from Shon's death grip, Dale was in no rush to rise from the bed. When he did, he was trembling all over, with no sign of his previous bravado remaining. Yet as feeble and miserable as he looked, his new 'parents' weren't letting up. Shon stood in front of him with claws on hips. “We're going to take Talek and Rilka downstairs so they can have some lunch and play in peace. You are going to stay here and think about your choices. We'll come get you at dinner time.”
It took some time for the pair to settle into play due to the shock of what had unfolded upstairs, but settle they did, losing themselves in a simple make-believe story played out with action figures. An hour or so after lunch, all eyes were drawn to the soft creaking of the stairs as a pale, shamed Dale crept into view.
Cold as ice, Shon addressed his unwelcome arrival. “You were told to stay in your room.”
“I... I need the bathroom,” Dale whimpered back.
“You're wearing a diaper. Get back upstairs before I give you more blisters to sit on!” The boy retreated, sobbing openly as he went. Shon went to check on him twenty minutes later.
They saw nothing of Dale until dinner time, when he was escorted downstairs by Shon. The diaper had been removed, and judging by how the boy squirmed, and the wet sheen on his rear, he'd been lucky enough to receive a hefty dose of nano-lotion. “Dale and I have come to an agreement,” he told Liki. “We've decided to start over and put today's unpleasantness behind us. We'll cut him some slack, and he'll show us the proper respect. Isn't that right, Dale?”
“Yes, Mr Dafron,” the boy answered.
“Take a seat, Dale. I'm sure you're hungry after such a hard day.”
The teen ate in silence. His presence served to dampen the rest of the table as well; Shon and Liki's words felt forced, while Talek and Rilka kept any discussions to monosyllabic responses to direct questions. It was only when all three children were sent back upstairs that anything resembling conversation resumed.
Dale eased himself onto his camping mattress, lowering himself down gingerly for fear of a sudden flare of pain upon his rear touching the sheet. With no such suffering forthcoming, he shuffled until he was comfortable and sat hugging his knees. Liki turned the radio on before leaving the trio to their own devices.
“How come you're naked?” Dale asked. He didn't look at Rilka directly, but he hardly needed to.
“I... was rude to my dad,” she answered.
“And he stripped you bare for that?”
“Not exactly. I undressed because I thought I was about to get spanked and he decided to go easy on me. I'd rather be exposed than have a burning rear.” Dale winced at the girl's words.
The teen's eyes drifted to Talek, lingering on the boy's claw as he fetched his cuddly snake floof. “What do your letters mean?”
Talek glanced at them in an almost guilty fashion. “I'm a 'juvenalas penitatas',” he answered. “I was sixteen when they sentenced me. I'm serving nine to twenty-one.”
Fear bleached the colour from Dale's snout. “You're sixteen and they made you a Penny?”
“Yeah.”
The teen began to massage the 'K' letters on the back of his own claws. “The spanking I got... is that normal?”
“They gave you a bad one,” Talek answered. “But... you could get worse. I've had far worse,” he reiterated with a mournful note.
“It's not just spankings they dole out, either. You might be in for some unpleasant surprises yet,” Rilka warned. Her words served only to deepen the boy's misery.

When bedtime came it was the younger Penny's turns to put on a show. Dale initially protested at how early it still was, but a sharp glare from Shon put an end to that immediately. “We want you to see what a bedtime routine can mean in a Penny house. They don't get bedtime spankings every night, but it's common enough, especially for a Penny new to their sentence. Talek, Rilka, go get yourself ready.”
That instruction meant using the bathroom and undressing. Dale was invited to stand out of the way and watch as Talek and Rilka approached their parents. Liki flashed a brief smile at the pair. She had her claws behind her back. “Rilka? Pick a claw. Left or right.”
“Umm... right?” Her mother smiled and revealed a bare claw. Her left appeared holding a wooden hairbrush.
“Sorry, Talek. Looks like you're getting the harsher swats tonight. Come on over, Rilka. We'll do yours first.”
Rilka trotted over, knowing from years of experience dawdling wouldn't help. She settled into place, letting out a slight whimper as her cream tail was pulled away from her rear. A parental paw slapped against her rear, sharp and quick, making her jump more out of surprise than pain. The rapid follow-up slaps drew yelps and blubs from the girl, swiftly turning her cheeks red as Liki rushed through the bedtime discipline. Hardly the worst she'd endured, it was over almost as soon as it began, and she was passed to Shon for a quick cuddle. “Talek, you're next.” 
Mumbling under his breath at the unfairness of fortune, Talek was helped into place and allowed his mother to grip his tail. She looked to Dale and spoke calmly, “Bedtime spankings can be with a parental palm, or an implement. It depends on what we think is needed, but we also try to add a little variety to keep these punishments from becoming routine.” With those words given the hairbrush came down, it's wooden face whoosing before coming to an abrupt, stinging halt on Talek's green backside. He didn't hold back, letting out his first wail as Liki lined up another. In contrast to the hand-spanking, this one was being done slowly and deliberately; three good, hard smacks on each cheek left him blubbering, and he was glad when Liki helped him into a kneeling posture so he could rest against her.
“Now that they've had their smacks and a cuddle, they're ready to be put to bed,” Shon told their guest. “Come on, Rilka. Pyjamas on and under the covers!”
Despite their sniffles, the two youths were tucked in and given goodnight kisses. The lights went out, and for a time the only sound was that of two spanked rejuves quietly waiting for the stinging to stop. Soon after, they both became aware of the muffled sobbing from the floor at their bedside, which continued well after they had both drifted off.

The next morning, to Talek's surprise, it seemed that it was to be a weekday like any other. The morning routine of getting ready for school went ahead uninterrupted, and judging by the not-so-subtle encouragement from Liki, Dale was coming with them.
Liki explained as she ushered the three children out of the front door, “School is an important part of Penny life. It's a place to make friends, gain new skills or refresh old ones, and it gives us parents a little time to ourselves! Just follow Talek and Rilka, Dale. They know the way.”
The day was mild and pleasant, free of the wind and rain that had been so frequent in Talek's time in Northrock thus far. Liki walked a few paces behind to give them space with their guest, who mostly studied the pavement at his feet. “Are you nervous?” Talek asked.
“What?”
“Are you nervous about the Penny School? I know I was!”
Dale huffed at the response. “I want my PADD back. Everyone probably thinks I'm dead.”
Rilka let out an amused little snort. “I barely remember the Galactic Net exists! I do miss it sometimes.”
“You miss the porn, don't you?” Talek asked, letting himself snicker at the response he knew was coming.
“Why else would I be on the Net? Although I suppose I don't miss the porn as much as I used to,” she added with a wink to her beloved Talcum.
“Do you get punished at school, too?” Dale asked after a pause, perhaps having recalled how much he would like to browse that side of the Net.
Talek answered him, “Unfortunately. If you don't do your homework, or don't pay attention in class-”
“Or do badly on a test!” Rilka chimed in.
“-yeah, that. Do any of those things or anything else to make the teacher mad, and you'll get spanked in front of everyone!” The warning drew a pained little gasp from Dale, and Talek couldn't help but feel a pang of sympathy. This visitor was physically older, but otherwise was going through the same ordeal he had not that long ago. “Hey, Dale? I know it must not seem like it with all you've been through, but our parents have always wanted to help us when we're struggling. I would have saved myself a lot of pain if I'd just talked to them about how I felt, and what I was finding it hard to deal with.”
“Like what?”
Talek instantly wished Dale hadn't asked that question. Gritting his teeth, he rolled possible answers around in his head. “I let people lead me into doing some really stupid things. My mom, actually; my birth-mom, I mean. She's a Penny too. She convinced me to try and help her escape from Northrock. It failed since our parents knew about it from the start, but I got punished really bad for being involved. If I'd have just talked to my parents, or a teacher, or anybody about what she wanted me to do I could have avoided a lot of misery...”
Dale shook away the suggestion. “They can't help me with my problems.”
“You'd be surprised what we can help you with,” Liki called from behind, startling all three children. “Perhaps we should all sit down and have a chat after school? Help you onto the straight and narrow path?” Dale remained unconvinced.

Rather than the usual Miss Bassel, Talek's class was taken by Mr Hachi, who would only say that he was substituting in on short notice. Dale was singled out almost immediately and invited to sit up front, much to the boy's dismay; he'd initially tried to grab an empty desk at the very back. While the rest of the class were set to their educational electives, Mr Hachi made sure Dale was set up and, much to Talek's surprise, treated him much like any other pupil. The rest of the class couldn't help but whisper, however, and began to do so as soon as the teacher's back was turned. Quick as lightning, Mr Hachi snapped around and barked, “nobody doing that much talking could possibly be focusing on their work!” Silence fell. Talek felt relieved that he had kept his mouth firmly shut.
Naturally, once lunchtime rolled around, the pent-up questions came flooding out. It fell to Rilka to handle most of the questions as Talek's attention was taken up with Dale. He was hardly the only one staring; the fifteen year old towered over the other rejuves. He'd hung back in class for some reason and was now sheepishly shuffling forward at the tail end of the lunch queue, looking hopelessly lost and forlorn. As he made his selections, Isabelle applied a decidedly un-Completas-like elbow to Talek's ribs.
“Ow! What was that for?”
“Are you really going to leave him floundering looking for a place to sit? He's living in your house!”
Taking the hint, Talek stood up and waved to Dale, beckoning him over. The teen meekly hovered as the group shuffled to make room for him. “Hey, sorry we didn't get a chance to introduce ourselves earlier. I'm Isabelle,” the white-furred fox offered her paw in greeting.
“Hi,” Dale shook it reluctantly.
Talek took over the introductions. “These are our friends; Bubbles, Kost, and Ki'reth.”
“Speaking of friends, where's Lusu?” Ki'reth asked.
Rilka shrugged. “No idea, but classroom whispers say she had a rough weekend.”
“How rough?”
“The kind of rough where even the neighbours can hear you crying.” A series of sympathetic groans and utterances circled the table.
“She really needs to learn to keep her gob shut,” Kost snorted between mouthfuls of thin cut meat. “Or at least think for half a second before saying whatever she plans to say!”
“Not like you've ever put your foot in your mouth, right?” Isabelle asked with false sweetness.
Kost couldn't resist the bait. Grinning ear to ear he replied. “Never. Not so much as cussed once in my whole fucking life.” The comment got him some chuckles, but once the group had finished and got up to leave, a silent Mr Hachi stepped in. His raised eyebrow was enough to halt poor Kost in his tracks, and his fate was confirmed with nothing more than a curling finger. “Shit!” the boy spat under his breath, hanging his head as he followed after the teacher.
“Umm, what's going to happen to him?” Dale asked as the pair split off and the rest of the group headed outside.
Talek answered, “Probably a mouth soaping. They'll work evil tasting soap up into a lather and scrub it all over your teeth and tongue. It takes like vomit and the way it feels on your teeth... urgh! If you're really, really unlucky they'll make you actually eat the stuff, like chew it and everything!” The boy's stomach churned at the memory of the eating contest where he'd had to do exactly that.
When poor Kost re-emerged, he was utterly sullen. He could barely look his friends in the eye as he mumbled an explanation to the question all of them bore, but none articulated. “I threw up,” came his whimpered answer. “After I stopped puking, he still soaped me out again!”
“Wow, old man Hachi must have been in a bad mood!” Rilka exclaimed.
Kost clenched his eyes shook and took a deep, heaving breath. “I just want to move on. I guess we're too late to join the Line Game?”
“Afraid so, but I think Bubbles wanted to slink off to the library,” Isabelle suggested with a grin. Kost mirrored her, then with a flick of a wave trotted away in search of his companion.

The afternoon was taken up with Ethics and Morals – a lesson all penitatas were required to attend. The few non-Penny pupils were free to work on other things, head outside or go home early as parental permissions dictated. Naturally, Dale was not among the excused; if anything he seemed to be singled out for special attention, grilled so frequently by Mr Hachi that the already weary teenager looked ready to snap. Unfortunately for Talek, the teacher's attentions did not remain with their guest.
Walking over to the boy's desk, and admittedly appearing sorrowful, the greying Karrian softly spoke to Talek. “I had hoped someone might misbehave enough to warrant a punishment, but it seems your services are needed. I am sorry, Talek. Please come to the front.” The teacher had the Fox Strap on his hip.
“Dale, and everyone else for that matter, let me have your full attention. This is a reminder for our guest that a Penny school is a place of punishment just as much as the home. Master Talek here might not have done anything to earn this, but that won't change the nature of the discipline. Consider this a demonstration of one of our more specialised implements.”
Sniffling before a single swing, Talek's pants were dropped around his ankles and he was placed over the desk with his rear towards the class. Mr Hachi gripped his tail and raised the blue leather strap up for all to see. “One side is smooth leather-” he flipped it around “-the other has these blunt metal studs. Near every Penny who has been on the receiving end agrees the flat face is preferable. This might not seem a hefty tool, but this is not intended for soft, jiggly bottoms!”
Talek felt the grip on his tail tighten. He braced himself, fingers and toes curling, teeth grit, eyes clenched tight shut. Leather met scale right at the tail base, and the searing shock of it sent ten thousand needles shooting up his spine and down to the tail tip. With scarcely any fat to soften the blow, the thudding smack was every bit as awful as he remembered from sport's day, where he'd first felt its bite.
The clap of five strokes echoed off the classroom walls, the same licks he'd earned for coming second at the sports event. He dared hope that was all, but a sixth clapped over already well-reddened scale and set him into an even more desperate wailing. Perhaps his teacher took pity, or as much as could be taken, for there was a measured pause in the spanking. “As you can see, Master Dale, the underside of a Karrian's tail is an especially sensitive little spot. In fact, let's ask the class: which is worse, tail punishments or thighs? K'ireth, Kost, Bubbles, you don't need to answer since we don't smack your tails! All who say 'tail' raise a claw! Thighs? Really, Sa'shel? Well that is interesting. So, providing you're not a Drakonian, it seems the base of the tail might be the worst place to get a smacking!”
Mr Hachi leaned in close to Talek. “How are you doing?” he asked softly.
“Pl's letitbe o'er!” the boy blubbed, red-snouted from crying.
A kindly claw – or as kindly as a teacher's could be – gave his own a squeeze. “I'm sorry, Talek. You have a few more to go.”
'A few' meant six. With the studded side.
Rather than being sent to the back of the class to stand in a punishment circle, where sound-dampeners would have muted his wailing to keep distractions to a minimum, Mr Hachi left him up front for all to see, howling out his pain as his tortured little tail radiated painful heat. Yet that wasn't the end of his humiliation: before sending him to put his snout against the wall, the older male had one last demonstration. Talek was turned to face his classmates, and Dale specifically.
“Keep your shirt lifted up please, Talek. Keen eyes might note Master Talek's package is a little chubbier than before. Would anyone care to tell me why a well-smacked little Cub might be in a state of pre-arousal after such an ordeal?” Mr Hachi's eyes stayed fixed on Dale long enough for some of the class to consider lowering their claws. The teacher picked Kost to answer, since his paw hadn't been raised in the first place.
“Umm... it's like... misfiring nerves, right? Like how touching something really hot sometimes feels cold instead?”
“That's an excellent answer! To your little bodies, stimulation is stimulation – you might hate every minute of it, but the nerves involved in getting you frisky are easily triggered while we're igniting your pain receptors! If-or-when you earn a punishment that deserves something applied directly to your naughty bits, which I assure you does happen, Dale, you can expect to be howling away in agony with a rigid little stiffy on display! Thank you, Talek. You can go start your corner time now.”

He was still stood with his snout to the wall when the home time bell sang its blissful melody.  Finally allowed to pull his pants back up, Talek walked with Dale out to the front of the school, meeting with Rilka on the way and finding both parents waiting. Liki led the way, with Shon hanging back alongside the shaken teenager. Two days of Penny life had utterly broken his tough-kid facade. It made Talek wonder how he must have appeared to others in those early days – had they seen the same change take place in him? Was he 'spanked into submission' like this as well? He had never been quite so overtly defiant, but still... It felt so strange to the nine-year-old Karrian to reflect on his own time in Northrock: not yet even a year into his sentence, the realisation that this life had become 'normal' stuck with him, and he wasn't sure how he ought to feel about that.
He was shaken from his own self-reflection by the pitiful whimpering of their guest. “I don't want to be here any more!” the boy whined as he followed his 'family' down the road. Normally, such cries would meet with no sympathy, but this time Shon seemed understanding.
“It's been one heck of a shock, I'm guessing? Seeing, and feeling what life is going to be like if you don't shape up and change your ways?”
Dale cast a desperate glance to the older male. “I don't know how! I know the people I'm with are trouble, but I can't say no to them! You don't just get to walk away from guys like that!”
“Yes you can. You can walk straight into the police station and tell them everything you know, everything that gang does and wants to do.”
“You mean become a snitch?” Dale recoiled at the idea, but Shon shut that down hard.
“Do you know what that attitude gets you, Dale? It gets you rejuvenated to age six and sent to live with a father like me for thirty years! Forget 'snitches get stitches', Pennys get paddles!”
“Even when they did nothing to deserve it,” Talek mumbled, still sore, metaphorically and literally, from the Fox Strap earlier.”
“Oh yes indeed! Out there, you only get paddled if you're a real bad boy. Here, you get paddled even if you're a little angel – you just get paddled more if you put a toe out of line!”
“I get it!” Dale snapped, flinging an arm up as if to deflect Shon's verbal barrage. “I get that you're going to make my life hell! But I'm scared, okay? I'm scared to rat them out! What if someone else comes after me? Or my friends, or family?”
Calmer, more fatherly now, Shon persisted. “The police will protect you, Dale. I'm certain that if you cooperate they will show you leniency. You are here to try and spare you from wearing correctional letters; they're not going to throw you to the magistrates for your confessional.”
“Gangs only persist because their leaders know how to stay just inside the letter of the law – police and courts can't 'technically' prove they've done anything wrong. That's why people like you are so important, people who can come forward and testify against them,” Liki offered her own advice on the matter.
Dale fell into a fearful silence, which the adults let him keep for a while. However, after a few minutes of no comment, Shon provided more goading. “One way or another, we're going to make a good man out of you. That's not an option. The only choice you have is how: you can prove your courage and face your fears, testify against your gang and do what you know is right... or you can keep your silence, and soon enough you'll be back here as a penitatas. Then we'll make you a model citizen, one long, painful spanking at a time, for year upon year. You've only seen the day to day stuff: you've not seen anything of the 'special days' that you'll have to look forward to.”
“C-can this please be over?” Tears welled up in the teenager's eyes as he begged for an end to his ordeal.
“That depends on what you plan to do when we're done,” Shon replied.
“I... I'll go to the police. I'll tell them everything.”
Shon placed a supportive arm around the young lizard's shoulders. “Good lad. I know that's not an easy call to make, but we're proud of you for making it. As soon as we get home I'll make a call. You can be out of here first thing tomorrow morning.”
“Thank you,” Dale mumbled. Then he wiped his snout with his sleeve, to the quiet distaste of his Penny Parents.

There was one last life lesson for Dale to learn before it was all over. Almost as if to keep him from second guessing his commitment to reform, Shon sat Dale down in the living room and discreetly described how 'personal gratification' was also something denied to penitatas. He then invited Dale to rub an innocuous cream onto his fingers, which led to the boy flinching as a hot burn began to pulse along his digits. Shon offered the remedy almost immediately, but a look at the quiet horror on Talek's snout let the teenager make the appropriate connection. “You... you put that... down there?”
“Oh yes.” Dale went deathly white at the idea. Happy the last lesson stuck, Shon quickly steered the focus to something more pleasant. “But I wouldn't want you to think we're entirely heartless. You've learned your lesson, and our little ones have had to suffer more than usual because of your visit. It seems fair to ease off a little, so we're going to share a very rare and special treat.”
Grinning, Liki turned on the holo and waved Talek and Rilka over. The pair squealed with excitement as they each picked a parent to snuggle with, and the dancing screen cycled to an animated family film.
“No offence, but when this is over I hope to never see any of you again,” Dale said as Shon dimmed the lights and they all settled down to watch the screen.
“The feeling is mutual,” Shon chuckled, “Now hush.”