What do I mean by this:
Well, most restraints that appear in stories are immediately tangible – they are right there and restraining the character right now. Handcuffs, ropes, cell bars, being chained to walls, that kind of thing. (These, by the way, are all things I very often enjoy as well. But they’re not what this post is about).
This post is about restraints that are there, but aren’t active. They’re lying dormant instead of actively restraining, and they will remain that way right until the point when the constrict tries to do the thing the restraints are meant to guard against.
In my own work, I made up a thing called Prisoner’s Bracelets – they are, as the name suggests, metal bracelets that go around a person’s wrists, and when they’re not activated, do not interfere with the person’s movement at all. However, they come with a ‘remote control’ that can make them adhere to any selected solid object – each other, the ground, a railing, a chain, etc. And they can be ‘programmed’, so it would be possible to keep someone in a house simply by having the the bracelets activate and stick them to the wall any time they try to cross the boundary.
In other works, the thing that comes to mind most immediately is Spike from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, who has a chip implanted in his head that’s meant to keep him from hurting people. As long as he’s not trying to hurt anyone, he’s absolutely fine. If he tries, he gets hit with debilitating pain.
A similar ‘triggering debilitating pain’ form played a central role in a fanfic series I read, where it is the effect of a ‘bond of tenure’ that enforces obedience to the principal’s orders.
Important Ingredients:
The thing that generally activates my kink for this is the constrict’s explicit awareness of the restraint. The restraint just being there does offer satisfaction, but it’s the acknowledgment that makes it ‘exciting’. In a video, the constrict explaining the situation to someone else will do it, as will, in the case of Prisoner’s Bracelets and the like, something like them looking at the ‘line’ that they can’t cross, then at the bracelets, and making an acknowledging expression or sigh. Things like tone and facial expression are generally very important here.
Related things:
A standing threat that is taken as absolutely true can play this role as well. So, if the constrict was told ‘I’ll be watching you, and if you talk to anyone wearing a blue shirt, I will have you beaten’, and they totally believe that the principal can and will do this, this will play into this kink for me. Similarly, the constrict being say, followed by a guard who is ready to grab them and administer some punishment should they ‘cross the line’ also would. In both these case, the important thing is, again, the constrict’s active awareness of the situation, and the tone of their attitude toward it.
Sometimes pain, and very rarely unexamined 