In school the next day, Tony realized that some of his homework was wrong. But that was no big deal. He wasn't perfect, but he was second or third in the class. But over the next week or so, he gradually noticed more and more mistakes in his work. The exams seemed to be tremendously hard as well. He wondered if the difficulty of work had been ratcheted up but found no other students grumbling about it. Nobody else seemed to notice any change. He wasn't starting to fail any classes, not even close. But he wasn't geting top marks they way he always had. He was getting grades in the lower third of the kids in the honors classes. The last straw was not finishing a math test the last period of the day. The teacher had to pull the test out of Tony's hands. All but one other kid had passed the test in and left. Tony still had a couple more questions to go but didn't get the chance to try them when the three sheets of paper were summarily pulled from his hands.
Tony trudged in shock to his locker. How can this be? Math is my best subject! I'm better at math than Craig Merriwether or Suzy Clifton! What's going on here? And while he fumed, the solution to a couple of the problems suddenly occurred to him. He groaned. The answers had been so obvious. He only relaxed when he reached his locker and saw jack already there, his ballet gear in his bag. Tony packed his ballet gear and walked off to that afternoon's class with Jack.
Tony's reluctance about ballet had disappeared after his one panic attack. He threw himself into his ballet dancing with every bit of athletic ability he had and felt not even a trace of self-consciousness at wearing a dance belt and tights in front of girls, parents or anyone. After one performance, he was introduced to a short, slim grey haired who he was told worked for a big city's ballet company. The man inspected Tony in minute detail, making him turn around a couple times and circling him once as well and complimented him for his technique, his leaping and for having "a really handsome face and a super muscular little ass there". Tony didn't bat an eyelash at the way the man discussed his body and looked at him and vowed his complete commitment to a career in ballet. The man promised Tony a spot in his company's school. Tony got high fives and congratulations from all the other dancers, especially Jack.
He and Jack wanted to celebrate and went over to Jeff's house where they knew they could get some beers. Jeff was there with Eric. His family had gone for the weekend and left him home alone.
"Perfect for chronivacing!" declared Jeff.
Tony's mind was blank until Jeff asked what animals they wanted to be changed into spurring recollections of their various transformations. The other three were undecided but Tony immediately laughed, "I want to be a jackass". The others were surprised at the choice but Tony was adamant. It seemed like a goofy fun thing to do. So it was that Tony found himself in Jeff's back yard stripping off his clothes and feeling the electric wave of the chronivac process coursing through his body.
The process wasn't painful, but Tony immediately had second thoughts. Jack and Eric had already become wolves, as would Jeff. They were going to go off and hunt down coyotes again.
Tony filled with revulsion at his ass body and wondered why the hell he'd chosen it after the terrible time he'd had before. But while his friends went off one way through the woods, Tony trotted off in gathering dusk along the paths through the woods behind Jeff's house. He hadn't gone more than a half mile before he felt a sharp sting at his right flank and then felt dizzy. To his horror, he could not remain on his feet and fell over on his side. In just a few minutes, three men and a boy stood over him.
"Jus' like they said, huh Zach? Great big one. Usually only see hinnies that big. Whoda thought a jackass'd be running around out here" said the one with the tranquilizer gun.
"He's gonna concentrate on the around part from here on out, or else" cracked the oldest one and they all broke into guffaws.
No! God no! Don't hurt me, please! I'm really a guy! Let me go back to running track and playing baseball! He tried to say these things and barely even raised a bray. Tony was a spectator at his own capture and transportation. He was tied with ropes and then pulled into a horse trailer then forcibly tied so that he stood upright despite his massive legs feeling like jello. They only drove three or four miles. Tony was sure of that. Despite his dizziness and the incredible headache he had, he made sure to figure out the route they traveled.
They arrived at a small farm and from the trailer window, Tony could see a horizontal wheel three feet off the ground set to turn around a center hub with a dirt trail around it. A yoke for a horse was attached to one spoke of the wheel.
"Oh no" Tony groused to himself. "Not that".
But it was that. The three men and a boy had another horse step into the trailer alongside jackass Tony and they tied Tony to it. They walked Tony to the wheel and yoked him into place. Immediately he felt a sting at his rear and heard the little boy laughing. He felt the sting again and again. Despite his thick hide, it was a sharp sting every time sort of as though he'd been whacked with a belt across the soft skin of his human ass instead of with the black stick/whip tool that the boy kept using on his hide.
That was how Tony spent the next 48 hours. There were 6 hours each night that he slept standing up and he was indulged with a few gallons of water. But, in the course of the next few days, Tony was whipped as he trudged in a circle. He overheard the men say that the wheel ran a well of some sort that they wanted to supply water to their farm. At first Tony would respond to getting his ass whipped and speed up, but no matter how fast he went, the boy just whipped him some more. The little psychopath never seemed to tire of whipping Tony and much of the time he laughed with delirious joy at it. Tony would love to have kicked the little brat's head off with his powerful rear legs but there was a metal bar just above the equivalent of the knee joint of his rear legs that prevented Tony from doing any kicking. Tony absorbed punishment, but even pain can become commonplace. Tony was eventually able to focus his still human mind on other things.
He thought of the math problems that he'd missed. He could recall the whole math test even while physically being a jackass and trudging around in a circle. How the hell did I miss those questions, he wondered? That was easy.
And he thought of ballet. It seemed ironic for a clumsy jackass to be considered a star ballet prospect receiving invitations to the schools of famous ballet companies. But, as he considered it, the career of ballet dancer only seemed a little more suitable than his present vocation. Why did I go along with that? Maybe it was just a teenage phase where he was fucking up in school and temporarily making an ill advised choice out of it but, something didn't seem right.
Tony trudged and took his whipping across his ass Saturday and trudged and took his whipping across his ass Sunday. The afternoon of the latter day he turned his head frantically to get a look at the watch on one the men's hand. It was 6:15. Tony's heart jumped. He was due to switch back to his human form at 8 o'clock. Jeff had programmed it that way.
With light gone and only the boy outside, still whipping Tony's ass, Tony started to change. The boy stood there gawking as the 900 pound beast of burden he'd beaten for the whole weekend suddenly started shrinking. The beast's long face and neck retracted and his thick hoofs split and became lighter. Its ears shortened and its tail disappeared. Hair and hide seemed to evaporate and suddenly, a very handsome but also naked teenage boy stood where the jackass had been. The sadistic little boy was only roused from his shock when he saw the vengeful expression on Tony's face. Tony took a couple running steps toward the boy and grabbed his two little wrists in one hand. He quickly dragged the boy over to the yoke where he'd been tied and secured his hands with a leather strap. Then Tony grabbed the boy's whip, a sort of long stick with a leather strap attached to it, the strap ending in a ball tied around a rock.
"Let's see how you like it!" said Tony and he whipped the little jerk's dungareed ass ten times in rapid succession. The boy immediately burst into tears and wailing cries for his father. Satisfied at how he'd turned the tables, Tony broke the stick over his knee and ran up close to the boy.
"Let that be a lesson to you. The next jackass might come after you, too!"
But the only person coming after anyone right then was the boy's father. Tony saw a tranquilizer dart pass right in front of his face and heard the father and his two friends shouting at him. Tony went into a mad sprint in the other direction. He ran across open ground and a haying field as fast as his legs could carry him. His lungs felt ready to burst but the sound of other darts cutting through the air just behind him kept him going. He was only a few hundred yard off the property when he saw Jeff's car approaching on a dirt road. He quickly jumped in and as they sped away in the opposite direction, they explained that, with certain advanced GPS features of the chronivac they were able to track him. Tony listened but didn't really get it. He was just happy to be safe again.