They say the penalty for pride is rarely sweet -- but in Pievale's confectionary works, today's retribution would be syrupy, sticky, and mercilessly pink.

For the fifth penance is about to be delivered by two of Crispin's quietly smouldering conquests: Rachel and Daisy, best friends and now joint owners of the Pievale Sweet Factory. In place of the usual sherbets and sugared mice, this afternoon it is repurposed into a temple of vengeance.

Both women had fallen for Crispin's charms in their time. And both had been tossed aside once his appetite wandered. Yet what rankled the most was the additional indignity of his endless banter ever after in The Cock Inn.
Rachel, small and lean, had grown up stoically enduring jibes about her flat chest -- but Crispin had elevated it to performance art: jests about fried eggs, ironing boards, and rumours of a bra with 'nothing in it.'
Daisy, by contrast, had curves he couldn't resist describing in crude detail -- suggesting she could 'breastfeed a nursery' or offer her bosom as a flotation device should the pub ever flood.
Rachel and Daisy bore it all -- until that is the penitent called on them offering himself up for more than poetic justice.

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The factory's interior hummed under floodlights. The air was hot with syrup and strawberry concentrate. And in the centre of the room, set like an altar of gooey reckoning, stood a monstrous vat of freshly churned bubblegum mix. Pink. Thick. Warm. Alive with slow, gloopy movement -- like some mutant fondue pot of doom.

Suspended above it, straining at every seam, was Crispin.
He dangled on a gleaming industrial slide, slick and steep. His body squeezed into a blinding green mankini, a garment that clung with obscene enthusiasm to his bare, freshly depilated form.
The thin straps of the mankini stretched high over his shoulders -- and higher still, where they looped over a metal hook mounted above the slide. Only this hook kept Crispin from a plunge into the sticky abyss, and his own weight was pulling the taut fabric ever tighter across his groin. He hung at a tilt, face-down, nose-first toward the pink mire -- squirming helplessly.

A crowd had gathered -- comprising the women of Piedale, many of them veterans of Crispin's former glories or humiliations. There was Molly the masseuse, arms folded with anticipation. Jenny the barmaid whispering innuendos into the ear of April the farmer's daughter, who snacked idly on a toffee apple. Mrs Lloyd the postmistress had brought binoculars. Rosie the baker's daughter clutched a candy floss. Kathy, yet another ex, leaned casually against the railing beside Lucy, whose wicked grin suggested she already knew what was coming.

And then the crowd hushed. Two doors creaked open.
The Avengers had arrived.

Rachel entered first. Her cropped top and miniskirt were unassuming, but her walk was purposeful. Her frame was lean, arms folded, eyes fixed on the man who once joked her figure needed subtitles. A faint smile danced on her lips -- slow and knowing.
"So," she said, her voice echoing off the tiles, "still think I'm a couple of fried eggs, do you?"
Then came Daisy. Lush. Radiant. Voluptuous. Her chest bounced with the kind of emphasis that left no doubt: Crispin's jokes had never been forgotten -- or forgiven.
"And apparently," she added sweetly, "I could breast feed a nursery? Let's see what you suck on today."
The crowd roared with laughter. Crispin groaned.

Rachel produced a pair of silver scissors. Daisy raised an identical pair. They ascended opposite sides of the slide with theatrical precision, strappy sandals clicking, skirts swaying.
Crispin squirmed. The mankini tore slightly. The hook creaked.
"Any last metaphors, darling?" Rachel asked, cocking her head.
Daisy smiled. "No? Then--"
"Snip snip."
SNIP. SNIP.
The straps snapped. The mankini twanged a final high note -- and Crispin plunged.

SPLUNCH

The vat welcomed him like a gluttonous feast. He hit the bubblegum headfirst -- pink goo exploding in all directions -- and vanished momentarily into the sticky depths. Seconds later, he remerged - gurgling, arms flailing, hair lacquered with syrup. Long strings of pink gloop trailed from ears, limbs, and lips. Every movement was resisted by the clingy, glue-like mass. He slipped and slithered, each attempt at escape only tangling him further in the clammy, cloying gum.

And then -- roared on by Molly -- the two studs from the beauty parlour vaulted in after him completely nude. The same pair who had painted him white, inside and out - their own assets swingling proudly. The trio converged and with glee Crispin was dunked again and again, hauled by ankles, flipped upside down, sat on, smeared with more gum mix as the whole vat became a bubbling orgy of playful retribution.

Then a fresh cheer arose from the crowd.
Rachel and Daisy, laughing like best friends let loose at a hen party, kicked off their sandals, stripped off tops and skirts, and leapt in after him -- both bare breasted, their broad, vengeful grins gleaming brighter than their shoulders.

Daisy landed feet-first with a splash, then immediately smeared gloop across Crispin's cheeks like icing a cake. She pinched his face with both hands. "Oink oink," she whispered, "our little gum pig."
Rachel slid beside him, twisting pink strands around his arms. "Still think you're clever?" she purred, inches from his ear. "Let's hear a witty one-liner now."
He tried -- but only gurgled as another dollop of gum slid into his mouth.

Together, they trussed him like a hog roast -- his limbs bound in long sticky ropes, his chest streaked with pink, and his hair spiked like a toffee apple. The crowd above cheered, clapped, whistled.

On a vantage point above them all, Circe looked down upon the mortals. Serene, implacable and radiant in robes the colour of spun cherry laces, "Five down," she intoned. "Two more humiliations yet remain before this piglet earns the hope of redemption."

And below, as one of the frolicker's fingers closed around his testicles, Crispin squealed.