STORY DESCRIPTION

Innocent and pretty Josephine K. is accused of committing a nameless crime by an all-powerful state and is soon trapped in a chilling paradox. Broken by relentless sexual interrogation, she wants to confess her guilt to end her anguish, but nobody will tell her what law she has broken. Her lawyer explains…

‘You are expected to know what is required of a good citizen. If you’ve done something wrong, then you should already know what it is. If you don’t know it, or are denying it, then by default, you are guilty.’

But Josephine does not know what she has done wrong, and until she confesses to her crime, she can never be punished for it, and if she cannot be punished then she cannot be free again.

Josephine is allowed out on bail (which she had to pay for with sex) while her nameless crime is investigated further. But the conditions and restrictions are grim. She is stripped of her citizen’s rights and turned into a “non-person”, marked in a distinctive fashion…

Josephine stood in the discharge room while the court guards fitted her out for bail. They removed the court tag from her ear only to replace it with a thick red metal collar which they locked about her neck. A tethering ring was recessed into its front rim. It was uncomfortably heavy and was stamped with the official seal of the court, her name and ID number, together with her case number.

Then he gave her a new set of clothes. ‘You will wear these whenever you are in a public place or in a vehicle on a public road,’ he told her. ‘Anything else and you’ll be punished for breaking the conditions of your bail, do you understand? That’s a month’s hard labour for a start.’

These were the things Josephine had been dreading. Yet they seemed innocent enough until you realized the circumstances in which they would be worn. There was a pair of ankle boots, a knee-length belted coat and a peaked cap. All were made of thin soft transparent plastic with red piping. Even the coat buttons were transparent.

And these were all the clothes she was permitted. No underwear. Nothing else!

Followed by the secret police wherever she goes, Josephine roams the city exposed and penniless, begging for help from friends and relations. But marked as a criminal she receives only fear, rejection or exploitation. Without money, all she has to offer in payment for goods or services is her body. Even worse, without any rights, she can be snatched off the street by anybody who wants to make use of her in any way they desire.

Josephine is subject to multiple humiliations and degradations at the hands of the police, court officials, a judge, a lawyer, a doctor and total strangers, who all take advantage of her. Gradually, however, she uncovers the shocking truth about the function of state as she is slowly driven back to the only person who might help her find out what her unknown crime was. But only at the cost of her total sexual submission…