**Processing Season II (Male World Order, part 9)**
**This story is a work of fiction and all characters, events, and locations described in it are purely fictional. No resemblance or connection to any living or deceased person or real-world event or location is intended.**
...
"You know, when I was a kid, garlic really tasted like garlic," Third Beta Doctor Lawrence Wayne said to his wife between bites of linguine with mussels. "Now's it's just so bland." The two were in Long Beach for for the wedding of Goody Wayne's cousin. They snuck out of the finger-food-only reception to get a decent meal before heading home.
"You say that about all produce, Larry. I assure you the garlic here is plenty garlicky."
"Fine, Collette, It's all in my head." He smiled.
"Or in those damned hot cinnamon cigarettes you smoke. You've burned out your taste buds."
"I switched to ginger-turmeric."
"Is that supposed to be better, Larry?"
"Hey, I see the pulmonary hygienist for a cleaning every year. May as well get my money's worth out of it." Dr. Wayne chuckled.
An out-of-place looking man in a beige suit entered the dining room and approached the Waynes' table. He flashed a badge.
"Dr. Wayne, my name is Police Second Beta Cisneros. You're going to need to come with me. Quietly, or otherwise."
"Wh... what's this about?"
"Third Beta, you are under arrest for multiple counts of physical battery against junior Betas in your custody. Once again, quietly or otherwise. I could not care less about making a scene, but I'm sure your wife would prefer this go smoothly.
Dr. Wayne stood. "Collette, I'll get this sorted out. They obviously can't be talking about me."
Collette just stared in disbelief, and tried to hide her shock.
PB2 Cisneros led DrB3 Wayne to the parking lot around back of the restaurant where two uniformed officers were waiting.
"Peel & bag him," Cisneros ordered.
The officers began stripping the 1890s-style morning suit off of Wayne's body. Much like the indentured servants in his care, his clothing was placed into a transparent barcoded plastic bin.
The two officers then made quick work of patting every inch of his skin down and doing a none-too-gentle rectal and oral search while Cisneros searched through his clothes.
They then handcuffed him and put a black bag over his head before shoving him in the back of the police airpod.
Despite what Cisneros had said about not making a scene, quite a little audience of men and women in their evening finery had gathered at the edge of the parking lot.
Crime in California? None of them could imagine such a thing.
...
Eons went by in silence and pitch black then the airpod doors swung up. Wayne was led down a long stairwell. At least four floors by his count. He stood naked on a cold floor for a long time while muffled conversation took place outside the bag on his head.
Then the bag was ripped off. Harsh old LED panel lights glared into his eyes. He was standing in front of a long desk in a windowless room. The officer behind the desk handed a rectangular device to the officer escorting Wayne. "Get his prints please."
Dr. Wayne felt the officer behind his back press the first three fingers of his cuffed right hand against the glass. The officer handed it back to the man behind the desk.
He scanned his computer screen for a moment, then clicked something.
"Lawrence Wayne, you are hereby temporarily redesignated as a Tenth Beta for the duration of your custody."
"Yes, Sir." Wayne said to the PB4. It was standard procedure, he told himself. All just standard procedure. He was shaking like a leaf.
"Now please stand back on the grating along the wall. If at any time you need to evacuate your bladder or bowels you may do so when standing upon such a grating, just remain in a standing position and do not touch yourself." the PB4 recited without looking up from his screen. The officer escorting him pushed him back onto the grate. As Wayne had long suspected, these things really were uncomfortable for bare feet.
A camera lens popped up from the counter. "Look straight ahead," the officer ordered. It clicked. He was then ordered to turn to his right for another photo, then one from behind, then one from his other side.
The PB4 handed the PB3 a 2-inch wide, long strip of what looked like red plastic with a number and a barcode on it. The PB3 attached it snugly around Wayne's neck.
"Alright, you can put him away," the PB4 finally said, and the PB3 escorting him guided him along a track of metal floor grating through a door and down a short corridor, then into a room where the grating took up much of the floor. He was told to stand in the middle.
The PB3 flicked a switch on the wall, and a cool shower of sanitizing solution rained down on Wayne. It was strong enough to smell like cheap laundry detergent but weak enough it didn't burn his eyes. It drizzled gently down for a few minutes, and Wayne started to notice something: his hair was dissolving. All of it. The PB3 flicked a second switch and the solution came down much more forcefully, stripping all the hair from his head, face, and body. The showerheads moved to a lower angle and circled around him, getting every inch, before returning to their high position and finally releasing a spray of pure water to rinse him.
Wayne felt naked. Truly naked.
The officer then approached Wayne and removed a strange-looking object from a sealed sanitary container. It looked like a small pouch made of thick metallic mesh. He placed this pouch over Wayne's genitals and tightened the metal ring that locked it in place.
"If you try and fuck with this, we can get you a tighter one, understand?"
"Yes, Sir."
Wearing this pouch somehow made him feel more naked, not less.
He was offered no towel, just led out of a door at the back of the room and walked along that track of drainage grating, dripping wet, through another door and past four occupied holding cells to be uncuffed and tossed into the fifth. Dozens of empty cells stretched out beyond. There really wasn't much crime these days.
The path of drainage grating he had been walking ended at a circle in the middle of the cell. 'The bathroom,' Wayne supposed. There was no furniture save a thin pad on the floor with a blanket that looked like knit plastic.
"Enjoy your stay, Tenth Beta." The PB3 left him.
...
Wayne did not expect to sleep that night, but at some point he did doze off. He stirred awake some time just after the sun started shining through the high window over his cell. He saw breakfast had been left for him on the floor. Congealed scrambled eggs and toast.
His bladder was bursting full, and despite everything, he had developed a morning erection that strained painfully against the metal pouch he was wearing. He squatted over the grating and released his bladder, while he was in the middle of emptying it he heard footsteps and a pair of feet and ankles appeared in front of his cell. He couldn't stop himself and tried to finish as quickly as possible before looking up.
