The Stox Box by Jack Peacock

[T.H.]

Hello Jack,

Sorry I'm this late to the party. After 6 years reading on the site, I finally discovered it had a forum for commenting purposes. Yeah, me!

Part 4 gave me these dark chills, I guess these were intentional.
On one hand I wish for another part and her at the mercy of Psycho Sally. One the other hand I fear for her sanity if she does so.
It's like a well made horror movie... do I really want to witness all the horrors she would go through at the mercy of "Psycho Sally".

I mean... we know by now she isn't a safe player and will harm somebody one day.

[jakbird]

 I fear for her sanity if she does so...

One of the reasons I started the Stox Box series was an experiment, to create a character with absolutely no description, everything left to the imagination.  If you look carefully, there is no "her" or "him" reference to the victim.  Anyone who wants to be that victim can fit right in.

Horror movie is a good analogy.  Psycho Sally is intended to be the last character anyone would expect to be the chain saw wielding monster, if she existed in real life.  Like any horror movie it's what you know will happen but can't see because it's just out of the camera frame.  In the stories the inner Sally becomes more and more visible as a danger, the "she isn't a safe player" you mention, but there's nothing tangible to serve as a warning sign.  Just out of the frame we know she's going to inflict great harm, that's her nature, but on camera there's never a visible mark on her victims.  Yes, the dark chills are intentional.

Like watching a train wreck or a plane crash there's a certain fascination in seeing the victim's psyche slowly crumble under Sally's relentless onslaught.  Adding the bondage, the encasement in the box, experiencing the victim's helpless condition as it contributes to the breakdown, all helps to paint the backdrop, just as the dark basement is de rigueur for the horror movie.

Technical aside: Psycho Sally's description comes from an unexpected source.  I'm a big fan of old movies, especially the 1930's B movies.  While watching one of the old Nancy Drew series (Bonita Granville played Nancy) it struck me that here was the 30's stereotype of the girl next door, high school student, perky, smart, a solid draw for the movie audience.  What if she turned out to be the villain in one of those movies?  Hidden behind that lovable exterior she's a soulless psychopath bent on destroying society one person at a time.  Psycho Sally is the result.
  Jack Peacock

[T.H.]

It's maybe a crazy idea:

It would be so (B-)Horrormovie if it was somehow in the end revealed that "Psycho Sally" would be just a part of the imagination of the main character. An avatar/expression of his/her need for (self-)punishment.

[teanndaorsa]

I can certainly imagine that, at some point, the protagonist's sensory deprivation and previous traumatic experiences might lead them to hallucinate a terrible scenario at Sally's mercy. What a relief it would be to find out that it wasn't actually real. Yet. :-P

[jakbird]

...and then the victim woke up.  It had all been just a bad dream.

This is the only time you'll ever see me use words like that.  They will never appear in a story.  It is a classical 'Deus ex machina' (divine intervention) of the worst sort, the kind writers rely on when deadline has arrived and there's no plot resolution.  Common in TV scripts (was it Dallas where a character was killed off and came back next season after the bad dream?) but I hope I haven't plumbed the depths of hack writing as yet. 

Would Hitchcock have Janet Leigh wake up at the end of "Psycho", exclaiming the famous shower scene was only a dream?  He would have been banned from Hollywood, or at least sent off to the B-picture unit.  And no one would ever have remembered that "eeh eeh eeh" soundtrack, the shadow entering the door, the torn shower curtain, the blood swirling into the drain, the brutal murder never seen on camera but vividly portrayed in the mind's eye as only as master of the art can.

Psycho Sally is all too real, in the fictional sense.  Hmm, that may be a contradiction in terms, but she does live on in the stories.  Self-punishment?  Perhaps, but only with the kindly, caring, guiding hand of dear sweet Sally....
  Jack Peacock

[T.H.]

Jack I thought rather of fight club then of some light... woke up after a bad dream. I agree that would really be BS.

Nah... not woke up after a bad dream but rather...
Had to be placed in a mental institution after a bad case of self harm, due to a particulary bad case of shizophrenia combined with PTSD.

We're talking about some serious bad crap here. I mean a psyche that's so fucked up and riddled by selfguilt that it channeled all self hatred into distinctive personality that torments the victim.
I couldn't pull this stuff up, so I shut up about it. I just find it a fascinating idea.
 
Either way. There is no place for a humpty dumpty everything will be fine happy end, I think we can agree on that. 

[teanndaorsa]

Psycho Sally is all too real, in the fictional sense.  Hmm, that may be a contradiction in terms, but she does live on in the stories.  Self-punishment?  Perhaps, but only with the kindly, caring, guiding hand of dear sweet Sally....

Entirely fair! Some more "kind, caring, guidance" from Sally posted in part 5 tonight.

[jakbird]

A victim who is helpless in the most literal sense, under the control of a psychopath smart enough not to get caught leaving traces behind.  To borrow your words, "We're talking about some serious bad crap here."

" I just find it a fascinating idea."  Like the trainwreck, terribly sad but we're all secretly glad it happened to someone else.  This is the first time I've tried writing from the antagonist's point of view, though indirectly so far.  I thoroughly enjoy it, which should ring some alarm bells.  I think more exploration of Sally is the future of the series.  After all, what DOES she intend to do?  Will it be the straitjacket for the victim driven insane by all that externally induced self-hatred?  Or maybe Sally really does see herself as kind and caring, according to how she sees the world?  It's tough to decide which alternative is worse.

My advice: don't be too eager to jump into one of those Stox Boxes...
  Jack Peacock

[T.H.]

Morbid fascination.

That's the perfect word to describe the I have for this series after chapter 5.
I mean this story lacks almost everything I look out for in smut... that's a cute sub, a firm but loving and caring Dom/Domme I can identify with and a (reasonable chance at) an happy ending.

But here I am, having lept the story up and posting just another comment.

I want to know what Sally is all about and what she will do to her poor victim and where these attrocities might lead them to. And I don't really want to know. Like a good horror movie...

[mari0]

terrifying but it is that tension that makes in ohh so erotic.
Can't wait for the next one