The word "peppered" in this connection bothers me. As far as I'm concerned, peppered is what you get when a spray of gravel hits you or when some other small objects hit you and bounce off you. Disproportionate to their mass, they sting.
Peppered is not what you are when the objects not only pierce your skin but penetrate the flesh deeply enough to get into the arteries. Surely those who, like DougR, say that they have been peppered, don't mean that they ended up in the hospital?