Chapter 1

Ragna pulled her motorcycle behind the abandoned warehouse, far into the desolate industrial park. She and Wen had met here several times before, since it provided assurance that they had not been followed. As Ragna expected, Wen was already waiting, her angular face betraying not a hint of emotion...

"We're on for tomorrow morning at 9:30 AM." Wen never wasted words.

"We? Or do you mean I'm on for tomorrow?" Ragna loved to tease Wen, who had no sense of humor.

"You're up, but we're all on."

"Have you decided on a hotel?"

Wen took a deep breath. "It's not going to be at a hotel."

"But the plan has always been that the exchange occurs at a hotel of our choice – so that we have control of the area, not him," Ragna reminded her.

"Which is exactly why Nikolai won't agree to our demand. He's just as afraid of a double cross as we are."

"So I have to go to a hotel of his choice?"

"Not exactly." Wen took a second deep breath. "You're going to his apartment."

"I'm going to give him access to two million US dollars in his own apartment in the middle of East Berlin. And why is he then going to give me the names of the seven Soviet agents in return?" Ragna couldn't believe the change in plans.

"It's more complicated than that," Wen explained. "You will give him a paper with the last four numbers of the Swiss account. One of the numbers will be wrong. He won't know that, but he won't be able to call the Swiss bank until it opens in thirty more minutes. So he'll have to give you the names before he can confirm that we've given him the right account number. And since he knows that we already have three of the seven names, he’s unlikely to trick us by providing any bogus ones. But if he does, you will know right away. If the three names are on his list, you will correct the 'error' in the account number."

"So he gives me a paper with the names. If I see that the three names are there, I correct the error. And then he shoots me and takes the list back!!" Ragna saw obvious flaws in this plan.

"He won't shoot you because he's still going to want to make sure that the account numbers are valid. And he can only make the confirmation call from the bank itself – from a public area." Wen's words were not as reassuring as Ragna had hoped.

"Well, I think this plan sucks," Ragna offered bluntly. "What if he cares more about offing me than about the money? Then he gets me and we get nothing."

"It's the best we could do," Wen said coldly, ignoring the question.

"What did the boss say about all this?"

"It was her plan. Meng thought it up herself."

"That bitch always hated us. How did you respond? Did you tell her that the plan sucked?"

"No," Wen looked directly at Ragna. "Meng didn't ask. She ordered. It is crucial that we get the names of the other Soviet agents. We have to take chances."

Ragna noticed Wen's use of the word ‘we’ again, as if this dicey scheme put them both at risk. It was easy to see that the only one taking chances was Ragna herself.

"And there's one more thing." Wen seemed to hesitate. Ragna stared at her. "When Nikolai confirmed the exchange, he said that he also wanted to consummate the deal. I took that to mean that he is expecting to have sex with you to celebrate the completion of our contract."

Ragna closed her eyes for a few seconds, then opened them. "I'm expected to fuck this guy tomorrow morning in his apartment, where we will have no back-up but he certainly will. Do you even know where he lives?"

"We know the building. We don't know the apartment number."

"Shit. Why don't you just order me to shoot myself? It will save a lot of time."

"Because you can't be armed. Nikolai likely will search you. I'm sorry. As I said, we need those names, even if it means we will have to confront a number of, um… uncertainties."

"Forty percent. I give this harebrained plan a forty percent chance of success. And a sixty percent chance that I'll be dead within 24 hours." Ragna shook her head.

"No. Thirty percent you'll be dead," Wen responded.

"So you think there’s a seventy percent chance of success?"

"No. A forty percent chance of success, I agree. A thirty percent chance you'll be dead. And a thirty percent chance you'll be captured and tortured for information you don't have."

“How very comforting.” Ragna felt her stomach tighten as the harsh reality of her predicament began to sink in. “But you know as well as I do that torture will only extend my life a day or two at best, before…”

“Very well, have it your way.” Wen sighed impatiently. “Sixty percent chance you won't survive the mission.”

Chapter 2

Ragna could hear the click of her black heels on the lobby floor. She straightened the black dress that hugged her well-shaped body and breasts. Under it she wore a pair of black panties. She saw no reason to wear a bra, since it would just come off with the dress if things got that far. Dress, panties, heels, sunglasses. A piece of paper in her pocket. Nothing more. No back up. No identification, not even a false one. She was a sitting duck if Nikolai and the Russians double-crossed her.

The concierge directed Ragna to the third floor. Apartment 321. But she had no way to tell Wen where she was going. If Ragna had a communications button, she could have told Wen the room number and then ditched the transmitter. But Wen had refused to let her take the device. “Meng’s orders, I'll bet,” Ragna muttered to herself as she headed for the elevators.

On the third floor, the room was the second one on the left. She knocked forcefully.

Nikolai answered immediately, dressed in a red robe. Ragna was certain that he wore nothing under it. He ushered her into the apartment. She saw a clock in the living room. Exactly 9:30 AM. As both Zurich and Berlin were on Central European Time, the bank would open in a half hour.

Ragna strutted past Nikolai, trying to look confident and secure as she entered the room. She turned to face him, standing with her legs slightly apart, one hand on her hip, the other reaching up to remove her sunglasses. She hoped a good view of her enticing curves and alluring features would endear her to the man, and perhaps reduce the probability of her demise at his hands.

"You have it?" Nikolai wasn't interested in formalities... and if he noticed Ragna’s charms, he wasn't letting on. Good, she thought. This may not take long. "Of course."

Ragna pulled out the piece of paper from her dress pocket. "The last four numbers," she said as she handed it to him. He reached into the pocket of his robe and handed her a slip of paper.

"The seven names." She glanced down at it. She saw the names of the three agents she knew must be on the list. She put the paper into her dress pocket.

"All right, good. One change..." Ragna told him. "The second to last number on the account should be a 7, not a 1. In case you failed to deliver. Shall we go to the bank to get your money?"

"It's still early. The bank doesn't open for thirty minutes. Why not celebrate our little transaction while we wait?" He reached for her hand. At least he was not unattractive. She allowed him to lead her into the bedroom.

He sat on the edge of the bed and looked at her. "Would you like me to do the honors, or would you like to do them for me?" she asked.

"Why don't you?" He responded and leaned back on his elbows, staring at her.

Ragna stepped back, tossed her sunglasses on a chair, reached over her shoulder and pulled down the zipper of her dress as far she could before moving her hands behind her back and pulling it down the rest of the way. She slid the dress off her shoulders and pulled it down to the floor. She stepped out of it and stood facing Nikolai, the nipples of her now naked breasts pointing at him as he sat on the bed. She kicked off her heels, then slowly removed her panties, standing totally naked in front of him.

"I hope you like," she teased him.

"What do you think?" Nikolai stood up and opened his robe, revealing that he was indeed naked underneath it. With his penis already erect. He took off the robe and sat back down on the bed, took her hand, and pulled her toward him. She spread her knees on either side of his body and took his penis in her hand. She stroked it several times before inserting it inside her, lowering herself to allow it to penetrate deeper. She was surprised at how moist she already was and how easily he entered her.

She felt Nikolai suck in his breath. He reached around her to push her body against his, crushing her breasts against his chest. His mouth was instantly on hers, his lips wide, his tongue searching. She responded and moved his left hand onto her right breast, their hips grinding.

He moved his mouth down to suck on her left breast. She grunted and shivered. This wasn't nearly as awful as she thought it would be. In fact, it had been a while since she had had an attractive man. Why did it seem that so many of the Russian males that she was required to bed as part of her assignments were old and flabby? Well, at least this one wasn't. She would make the best of it. After all, if even the slightest thing went wrong, he might be her last fuck.

She moved her arms around his neck. "Slow down, love, slow down. You're doing fine. Just take it slow ...." She could sense that he was trying to listen to her, but had to fight his urge to let himself go.

"That's right. That's better. That's better." Damn, she thought. He's trying, but he's ready to cum already. Just a little bit longer. Why couldn't he last just a little bit longer?

But Nikolai surprised her. He continued to pump himself deep into her sex. Over. And over. Again. And again. Each time she thought would certainly be the last. But it wasn't. Until...

Ragna screamed in orgasm and felt her muscles tighten hard around Nikolai’s cock. She thought she screamed "Yes, fuck me harder. Fuck me harder." But she wasn't sure. She just knew that, for the first time in a long time, a man had satisfied her. When Nikolai finally exploded inside her, Ragna felt her body bathed in sweat and her breathing grow heavy. She pushed him down onto the bed, her body on top of his, as he struggled to remain inside her. Finally, with both of them trying to catch their breath, she lifted herself onto her elbows and looked down at him. "That was fabulous. Really. Fabulous. I'm going to enjoy working with you."

He reached behind her head and held her face close to his. "You were great, too. We need to play some more later."

"I'll give you 15 minutes to recover. I can't wait longer than that," she smiled at him.

"It may take a bit longer, love. Just a bit longer," he answered.

Chapter 3

She felt a jab in her buttocks. She jolted. "Your fingernails are sharp. You're a bit kinky, I see," she responded. "Into pain?"

"I am. Are you?"

"Never tried it, But after that last encounter, I'll give you a chance at anything as long as you fuck me like that again," she cooed.

"Good," he smiled at her. "I'd like that."

Nikolai looked up at the woman and watched as her eyes slowly closed and her body fell limply on top of his. He pushed himself out from under her and stood at the side of the bed, leaving her lying on her stomach, unconscious.

"You're welcome," said a man standing on the other side of the bed. He was still holding the needle that he had plunged into Ragna's buttocks. "I didn't have to wait for you to finish, you know."

Nikolai reached over to grab Ragna's arm, and rolled her onto her back. "You are too kind, Alex. Too kind." Nikolai walked to the foot of the bed and spread Ragna's limp legs. "You want a go at her?"

"There should be time later," Alex responded. "Besides, I prefer them conscious and screaming." Alex stroked the dark triangle below which Nikolai's semen was dripping, then moved up to squeeze Ragna’s breasts. "Real. Very nice." Finally, he stroked her dark shoulder-length hair. "Why do women like her get involved in things like this. Don't they know that it is not at all healthy for them?"

Alex walked to his dresser, opened the top drawer and removed several long ropes. He rolled Ragna back onto her stomach, looped the middle of one of the ropes around her neck and then brought its ends down to tie her arms and wrists behind her back, her elbows forming right angles. "Watch and learn, Nikolai. It's called shibari. Well, my version anyway. With an added touch."

Alex secured a second rope to the first at Ragna's waist and pulled its ends down between her legs, then back up between the cheeks of her buttocks before securing it tightly to the rope holding her wrists behind her back. Finally, he took a pair of white socks out of his dresser and tore three long strips from the white bed sheet on which Ragna's body lay. He placed one sock into each of Ragna's eye sockets and tied one of the bed strips around her head, securing the socks in place. Alex stuffed Ragna's panties into her mouth and tied a bed strip between her lips and around her head as a gag. Finally, he used the third bed strip to tie her ankles together.

Just as he finished, there was a knock on the door. "Perfect timing," Alex smiled. "The clean-up crew is here." Alex moved to the living room and opened the door. Two men walked in, pushing a large half-filled laundry cart. They entered the bedroom, and, without a word, rolled the bed sheet around Ragna's body. They lifted the sheet and put it and its cargo into the laundry cart, then tossed a half dozen towels over her.

"Take her to the interrogation room at Karlshorst," Nikolai instructed.

"No," Alex overruled him. "This one may be important and it may take awhile. Karlshorst is too exposed. We need to take her someplace more secure. Out of town. The Barn, at the KGB facility where I work is ideal. But first, make your normal laundry run. Do nothing different. I will probably get there before you. If I'm not there when you arrive, wait for me at the gate."

Nikolai looked at him. "To the Barn? That is reserved for ..."

"For serious interrogation, yes. She is a Chinese spy. Or did you forget that when you were fucking her? Take her to the Barn," Alex repeated the instruction and the two men wheeled out the cart with their prize inside. The Barn was a half hour outside East Berlin in a very isolated location.

Shortly after the two men left, a woman entered the apartment. Like Ragna, she had dark, shoulder-length hair and a killer body. Alex picked up Ragna's dress, removed the paper from its pocket and tossed the dress to her. The woman slipped out of her own dress.

"No bra," Nikolai instructed. The woman shrugged and removed her bra, revealing her ample chest, then put on Ragna's dress and shoes. The shoes were just a bit tight, but the dress fit perfectly. Alex handed her Ragna's sunglasses. By this time Nikolai was himself dressed in a blue shirt, dark pants and shoes. He took her arm. "Shall we?"

The pair exited the apartment, leaving Alex alone.

Outside the apartment building, Wen and two male companions watched from a van across the street. They saw Nikolai walk out with the woman on his arm, heading in the direction of the bank two blocks away. 9:55 AM. Right on time. Just then, a laundry truck passed unnoticed between them, driving in the opposite direction.

Wen and her companions could still see the pair as they entered the bank. Fifteen minutes later they left, both smiling. They walked back toward the apartment building, still arm in arm. Wen looked at the couple. Even when the woman seemed to stare right at the van, the sunglasses obscured her eyes and Wen could not tell if she was in fact Ragna. She looked like Ragna, so Wen kept her suspicions to herself.

The man and woman entered the apartment. "Now we wait," Wen said. "She should be out in a few minutes."

"Unless Nikolai was great in bed," one of the men offered. "Then she may be a while."

"Listen," Wen snapped. "You give her the respect she deserves. She is risking her life for this mission. And how would you like it if you were ordered to fuck Nikolai?"

Two hours later, they were still waiting for Ragna to leave the building.

Chapter 4

Alex finally saw the laundry truck when it was a few hundred yards from the entrance to the Barn, where he was waiting for it. There was nothing near the KGB facility, which was well out in the countryside at the end of the single laneway leading to it. The isolation certainly served its purpose.

When the truck reached the end of the lane, the two men inside jumped out and removed the laundry bin from the back. They pulled off the towels on top, then reached in to remove the white sheet and dump its contents on the ground. They pulled the now revived Ragna to her feet, still blindfolded, gagged and elaborately tied, holding her by her elbows to keep her from falling.

Alex approached the bound figure. He could hear groans escaping her lips and he wondered how long she had been conscious.

Alex reached around Ragna's head and untied the bed strip holding the socks that blindfolded her. As he pulled the socks away, Ragna blinked hard several times, her eyes adjusting to the late morning sunlight. She glanced to each side to see the men holding her arms. She tugged at the ropes behind her back, forcing her chest out while confirming her arms, wrists and elbows were firmly secured. She looked down and saw she was completely naked, with a thick, coarse rope splitting her labia and her buttocks.

"Certainly you understand, Miss Ragna – I believe that is your name, according to our intelligence – that we know that you are a Chinese spy whose mission was to bribe a Soviet agent to release confidential information."

Ragna's chest heaved. Of course they knew. It was foolish for her to have thought that she had even a forty percent chance of success. Her mission had been doomed to failure all along. The odds were not even the proverbial slim to none. Just the none. And the chance that she would die very painfully today was uncertain only because she didn't know how long the KGB intended to torture her for information before they killed her. So she figured there was a ninety percent chance that they would finish with her and dispose of her today or tomorrow. And that was if she was lucky. She didn't want to think about that other ten percent.

"It's time for us to go to the Barn and have a little chat about your mission." Alex tied another rope to the one cinching Ragna's waist and held the free end so he could stop her if she tried to escape. As if that would ever be a thought in her mind. He pushed her in the middle of her back.

"Move." Ragna started to walk, nearly falling on her face when she felt how excruciatingly painful each step was as the rope running between her thighs cut into her flesh. Still, she had no choice. She began to walk slowly, trying to hide the pain from her captors as best she could – which was not very well.

The pebbles that filled the parking lot cut into the soles of her feet for the first hundred yards. When the men led her past the guardhouse and along a chain link fence that surrounded the thirty acre compound, Ragna was relieved when she found herself walking on grass. But that change did not reduce the discomfort of the rope chafing her with each step she took. [See Ragna Photo]

After a few minutes Ragna noticed something to her right. As the group got closer, her heart raced. The bodies of two women – naked except for their boots – were hanging by their heels from a tree branch. It was apparent that they had recently been executed by a firing squad as their bodies, from below their shoulders to just above their hips, were riddled with bullets. Ragna stared at them to determine if they might be Chinese agents. [See Shot Photo]

"Don't worry, Miss Ragna," Alex assured her. "Those weren't any of yours. No, they were actually Soviet agents who proved, well... who proved that they could not be trusted. They were not traitors, really. Just incompetents. So we let them off easy. With all of their body parts still attached. There is anger in treason, and anger must have an outlet. But there is just disappointment in incompetence. Like this one.” Alex nodded to a spot about forty yards away. “I see that we are having a very busy day today."

A red-haired woman with her hands tied behind her back, blind-folded and wearing a loose fitting white dress and black boots, was standing parallel to their path, her knees shaking visibly. Ten yards away, six soldiers stood side by side, holding their rifles in front of them.

A seventh soldier walked up behind the blindfolded woman, grabbed the dress at the shoulders and, in one motion, pulled it down her body, letting it drop to the ground. She was not wearing undergarments and was left standing in only her boots. The man lifted one of her ankles, then the other, to pull the dress away before carrying it back to the line of soldiers. Ragna could hear him scream the word "Ready." [See RebEx Photo]

"She too is one of ours. We seldom have three executions in one day," Alex explained to Ragna as she heard the word "Aim" in the distance. Ragna stared mesmerized at the woman as she heard the word "Fire" and six slugs ripped into the prisoner's torso. The force of the blast knocked the woman down onto her back. She twitched for several seconds and then was still.

"You would think that we had many incompetent Soviet agents, but we don't. I think these were the only three this week. You just happened to arrive at an opportune time. This one will hang by her boots with the other two for several days as a warning to all – particularly our own soldiers – who visit the Barn." Ragna understood Alex's emphasis. Those who were not Russian soldiers who visited the Barn were accused traitors and spies, not incompetents, none of whom would benefit from such a warning.

Ragna felt the butt of one of the men's rifles push into her back, signaling her to march on. Her eyes darted to her right, as she walked. She saw the soldiers lifting the red-haired woman's corpse and carrying it toward the hanging bodies of the other two victims. Alex had made clear that these three were the lucky ones. Incompetents, not traitors. Killed but not tortured. Ragna knew that she could not expect the same leniency.

As they continued to walk, Ragna soon saw where she was being taken. The place was aptly named. Up ahead was a large barn. She could only wonder what lay in store for her behind its walls.

Chapter 5

Wen's binoculars were trained on the woman when she finally emerged from the apartment building three hours later, still wearing her dark sunglasses, but this time attired in shorts, a T-shirt and tennis shoes. She carried a small clutch bag over her shoulder.

"Motherfucker," Wen whispered under her breath. The two men in the van looked at her. "This one doesn't have a butterfly tattoo on her left thigh like Ragna has. And I noticed before that she was walking funny to and from the bank, like her shoes didn't fit. Her face behind those sunglasses. Her nose looked... it just didn't look like Ragna. Damn me. I should have figured it out when I first saw her. Now we've lost several hours. Follow her."

The man in the driver's seat slowly pulled the van onto the road, as the woman got into a car a dozen yards ahead of him. It did not seem that she was concerned about being followed, as she took none of the evasive maneuvers used by someone trying to lose a tail. Maybe she wasn't an operative. Maybe she was just a stupid operative. Maybe she wasn't even the woman who had accompanied Nikolai to the bank. Wen wasn't sure. She just knew that this woman was not Ragna. And that the one who accompanied Nikolai to the bank probably was not Ragna either. All of which meant Ragna had not been seen for more than three hours... and the odds of her being dead or captured had risen substantially.

After a few miles, the woman turned into the driveway of a large building and drove to a parking lot behind it. "If there's no one back there, we grab her," Wen instructed, even though they would be doing so in broad daylight. Quickly, the driver followed, reaching the lot just as the woman was exiting her car. No one else was in sight.

The two men jumped out and grabbed her, a hand immediately moving over her mouth to stop her from screaming. Wen opened the van's side door. Within five seconds the woman was inside, the door closed and Wen had jammed a needle into their captive’s arm. The van sped out of the driveway and down the street as the woman's body grew limp. Wen pulled a green hood over her head and zipped it closed. She would have the air she needed to breathe, but not much more.

"To the Yellow House," Wen directed. It was one of two safe houses the Chinese used on the outskirts of the city. The basement was not soundproof but it was far enough from the nearest neighbor to draw no attention. Wen was nearly certain that the woman they snatched had been the one who had posed as Ragna. But whether she had or not, she likely would face a fate similar to Ragna’s own. That is, if Ragna was still alive. That too might be something they could learn from this woman.

They reached the Yellow House in twenty minutes, drove into an attached garage, and dragged their unconscious captive out of the car and into the building. The sole occupant of the house, a woman, watched without a word. Wen offered no explanation. The two men put the prisoner's arms around their shoulders and carried her down to the basement. Wen and the woman followed.

Wen looked at the man who had been driving the van. "Sung, strip her and tie her down." She nodded at a wooden chair near the center of the room. Sung dropped the woman onto the chair and quickly removed her T-shirt. When he grabbed her shorts and pulled them down, her panties came with them.

After pulling the woman's clothes off completely, Sung tied her arms behind the chair. He fastened her ankles to the chair’s front legs, forcing her thighs wide apart and emphasizing her completely shaved pubis. He left the hood on her. [See Greenbag Photo] The woman's head slumped to her chest.

Sung filled a bucket of water and threw it on their naked prisoner. The cold and shock startled her to consciousness. Wen and the others waited a few moments and watched as the woman tried to figure out where she was and how she got there. They saw her nipples quickly harden from the cold and fear.

"In case you haven't figured it out," Wen started, "you are now in the custody of the Chinese. Do you understand?"

After a few seconds the woman nodded.

"We have questions to ask you. Do you understand?"

Again, the woman nodded, this time more quickly.

Wen walked up to her and grasped her nipples in her hands, then twisted hard. The woman let out a loud whimper. "We have total control over you, do you understand that?"

The woman nodded once more.

"Tell me your name," Wen ordered.

"Anya," the woman said shakily, but her answer could clearly be heard, even through the hood.

"How long have you worked as a Soviet agent?" Wen continued.

"No. No," the woman seemed startled by the question. "I am not an agent."

"You were with a group of Soviet agents all morning, were you not?"

"Yes. Well, with two. Two Russians."

"Their names?"

"Alex and Nikolai." Wen was surprised at how cooperative Anya was. She could see that her body was beginning to sweat profusely, despite the cold. "But I'm not a Soviet agent," she protested. "I am .... I am a prostitute."

Wen stepped back. A prostitute? The woman might be telling the truth. "Tell me why you were at Nikolai's apartment this morning." She walked up to Anya and grabbed the sides of her mouth through the hood. "The whole truth. This is your one chance to save yourself." She loosened her grip.

"Nikolai. He is one of my johns. He hired me for yesterday and today. I stayed with him last night, and then this morning, at about 9:00, he told me to go down to the restaurant on the first floor and have breakfast, and to come back a few minutes before ten. So that's what I did."

"And what happened when you got back?"

"Nikolai and Alex were there. And they told me to put on a black dress and shoes that they gave me. So I did. And then Nikolai told me to walk with him to the bank and back. So I did that, too."

Wen was trying to figure out if Anya was telling the truth. "Was there anyone else in Nikolai's apartment during any of the time that you were there?"

"No. No one else. Just Nikolai and Alex."

"And after you got back from the bank, what did you do until the time that you left?" Wen unzipped the green hood and pulled it off. She wanted to see Anya's face and eyes. Anya blinked hard to adjust to the light of the room, then looked around at the faces staring at her. Two women and two men. She took a deep breath.

"After we got back, I... I fucked Alex. And then I fucked Nikolai. And then I fucked Alex again. And then I fucked Nikolai again."

"For three hours? You're telling me they had the stamina to last for three hours... with you?"

"No, of course not. Five minutes each at most. But then they needed some time to recover."

Chapter 6

"I am going to give you a chance to avoid a lot of pain, because, well, I'm feeling generous today," Alex spoke to Ragna as the group reached the front door to the Barn.

"What's there to tell?" Ragna's voice was firm. She had had a lot of time to think about what she would do when the time – or rather the pain – came. She was not sure how long her strength would hold, but, for now at least, she had resolved to remain tough.

Alex nodded at the two men from the laundry truck. They pulled the naked Ragna to an exterior wall of the Barn, to the right of the main entrance. They untied the restraints behind her back and then pulled out the rope now deeply lodged between her sex and buttocks. She let out a long sigh of relief without realizing that she had done so.

With Ragna’s back to the wall, the men chained her spread-eagle to four metal shackles embedded in it. She quickly realized that these shackles had been positioned to hold a man body's in place – or at least someone much taller than she was. Her body was completely stretched – generating even more pain than had the chafing ropes. Still, she soon found herself crucified naked and helpless against the Barn's wall.

"I'm sure you can imagine, Miss Ragna, the things that we can do to that lovely body of yours to make you beg to tell us everything we want to know.... even things we don't need to know." Alex's voice was cold. "Shall I go through the list?"

Now was her first chance to show her courage, and she knew that once they started on her, she might not find the strength to show any more.

"You already know that I tried to buy the names of the Soviet spies from Nikolai. At a very great price, since, as part of the deal, I had to fuck him as well." Ragna's voice was strong. She had hidden her fear well. "That was my job and that is all I can tell you. My boss is not stupid enough to tell an agent more than she needs to know, and that is all that I needed to know."

Alex looked to his men. "She's not ready yet. Maybe she will be ready by this evening. In about seven hours." They nodded at him. One approached her with a piece of metal in the shape of a U. He placed the two ends alongside Ragna's neck. Then the other man handed him a hammer. He pounded the metal tips deeply into the wall of the Barn until the center of the U was pushing against Ragna's throat.

"It won't stop you from breathing," Alex explained, "but it will keep your head still."

The second man put the two socks back in Ragna's eye sockets and wrapped a length of a tape around her head several times to hold them in place. He pushed her panties back in her mouth and used a second piece of tape to once again gag her.

A few seconds later she heard the tapping of a hammer above her head.

"Miss Ragna..." Alex said with a laugh. "You obviously cannot see what is written on that sign above your head, so I will tell you. It says, 'You are ordered to molest this Chinese spy before you enter the Barn. This includes permission to fuck her.’"

Ragna wondered how brave she would be after this ordeal was over. And she tried to remember how many hours Alex had said she would remain like this while they "got her ready."

Before she had finished her thought, she felt hot breath at the side of her face. And then a man's erect penis probing between her spread legs. Her interrogators certainly wasted no time. The man thrust deeply into her. She heard him grunt. She thought it must be one of the two men from the laundry cart. But she really couldn't distinguish one man's grunt of pleasure from another's.

Chapter 7

“I believe her,” Wen said after listening to Anya repeat her story a half dozen times. “She’s answered all our questions without hesitation, and I doubt she had any idea what the Russians were up to. It would make perfect sense for Nikolai and Alex to hire a prostitute who looks a bit like Ragna to play her part. They saw her picture only when we made the arrangements the day before, so they wouldn't have had much time to find and prep a suitable KGB operative. Besides, a hooker was probably cheaper than a trained agent.”

Wen turned to Anya and barked yet another question. “How much did they pay you?”

“Almost five times my usual fee. 12,000 marks,” Anya replied in a low voice.

“Pretty minimal overhead for a two million dollar transaction. And they got to bunny-fuck you to boot. Sorry, honey, but with a rack like yours, you should have done a lot better.”

“I... I didn't know – about the money I mean. Maybe I would have asked for more.”

“So you never wondered why you were sauntering off to the bank, arm in arm with a well-dressed Soviet agent?” Wen rolled her eyes at Anya’s apparent naiveté.

“I told you. Nikolai was one of my clients. I was just doing what he asked. I didn't know what any of this was about... I still don't. For a the money I was given, you don't ask questions.” Anya looked up at her interrogators, her eyes tearing up as she repeated her story yet again.

“And you weren't the least bit curious?” Wen asked, her voice indicating disbelief.

“Of course, but not enough to risk losing the business by being nosey and annoying Nikolai. I'm an escort. It’s my job to play along with what men want, not analyze them.” She sighed in resignation.

Wen turned to speak to the other woman, a svelte, stern faced Asian possessed of even less humor than Wen herself. “Like I said, she sounds legit. If we go on, we might just be wasting time pumping an empty well.”

Her body naked and glistening with the sweat of terror, Anya breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed at least one of her captors believed her.

“You must be growing soft as you age,” said the svelte woman, her tone betraying scorn rather than levity. Unlike Wen, she was not inclined to accept Anya’s explanation, no matter how credible it seemed. Wen, who had just turned 30, took offence to her colleague’s comment – especially considering the woman had at least eight years on her. Then again, she also was three inches taller, four times fiercer and two ranks higher up than Wen, so she let it pass.

“But Colonel Meng... we can only resort to more, um... persuasive methods if we have evidence that she is lying. Otherwise, we will not know if her confessions are reliable or merely desperate bids to evade...”

“Agreed.” Meng cut her off. “So all we need do is show that the slut is lying. That should be easy enough considering she clearly is not the sharpest tack in the box.”

“But the questions I have asked...”

“Have all been those she would be expecting,” Meng interjected once again. “It is clear you have had limited experience applying interrogation techniques. A subject can best be exposed by examining what she does not anticipate. Let me demonstrate.”

Meng turned to face Anya, who froze in terror as the intimidating woman glared at her.

“Where were you born?” Meng yelled.

“Odessa... 27 years ago.” Anya sobbed, adding more information than was required.

“When did you leave the Ukraine?”

“In 1979. I... I went to Moscow.”

“And East Berlin... when did you come here?” Meng’s questions came quickly. She did not give Anya much time to think.

“Just last year. One of my clients – a German soldier – said I could make more money in Berlin.”

“When did you start hooking?”

“Shortly after I arrived in Moscow. It was early in 1980. January... February... I'm not sure. It was very cold though... and I needed the money badly.” Anya began shaking, wondering why any of this mattered to her tormentors.”

“Did you make lots of money?”

“Yes... I guess so... more than I expected...”

“When did you make the most?” Meng’s voice grew louder as she demanded specifics.

“What?”

“When did you make the most money that year? Don't you remember?” Meng grabbed the shuddering woman by the shoulders and shook her as if Anya’s life depended on the answer to this seemingly innocuous question. In fact, it did. She had no idea what to say.

“I... I don't know. It was pretty much the same all year long. Maybe a little more in September, when the men returned from summer vacation with their families...”

Meng pushed Anya back viciously, almost flipping over the chair. The woman’s sobbing increased.

“The fucking bitch is no more a prostitute than I'm a rock star. What she told you might be true to a point, but she was in on it, that’s for sure.” Meng stood proudly, hands on hips, gloating over her success.

“How do you know?” Wen was as confused as Anya. She wondered how Meng could tell her subject was lying.

“July 19 to August 3, 1980 – the summer Olympics were in Moscow. Every five-kopek, snaggle-toothed whore in the city made a killing during those two weeks, and even this lame-brained twat would remember that if she was turning tricks back then.”

Anya’s shuddering grew. She stared down in defeat and humiliation. She had tried to be strong... and she had almost managed to fool her adversaries, but almost was not good enough, and it was little consolation as she sat nude and helpless at the mercy of her captors.

“So what do we do now?” Wen asked rhetorically.

“You know very well what comes next.” Meng’s lips revealed the slightest hint of a smile. “Now that we know the big-boobed bitch has a story to tell, we can safely administer the means to encourage her to be more forthcoming. It is time for the lovely Anya to see what we are capable of.”

Wen sighed and looked up at the men in the room, then nodded at one of them. “Renshu, get the tools.”

Chapter 8

Ragna had no idea how long she had been left shackled to the wall of the Barn, her shapely, nude body splayed out to be sexually used and abused by whoever passed it on their way into the building. She had lost track of how many men (and even women) had defiled her as she hung helplessly from the metal gyves. It had been more than a dozen, maybe even twenty – but after having her sex stuffed repeatedly by sundry cocks, as well as fingers, bottles and pieces of wood, it hardly seemed to matter.

A few passersby had interpreted the “fuck me” on Ragna’s sign as “hurt me”, so some of her more maliciously inclined patrons chose to inflict pain rather than penetration, not that one was any more pleasant than the other. One passerby pummeled her chest with his fists until she thought her breasts would burst. Another man – or was it one of the Russian females? – stubbed a lit cigarette on her clitoris. Many seemed not to notice Anya at all, perhaps not bothering to read the sign – and for this she was grateful. In any case, it seemed the “order” scrawled above her head was not being rigorously enforced.

Though Ragna could see little through the makeshift blindfold covering her eyes, she could tell that after some time, the sun had set. Fewer people were entering the Barn, and she could hear the sound of crickets and distant thunder. And then the temperature dropped suddenly and it began to rain. She was cold and wet and apparently forgotten by her abductors. She had thought they would interrogate her, but perhaps they realized there was nothing she could tell them. Instead, it seemed they would simply leave her stretched out against the Barn to die of exposure.

She wanted to drop her head forward onto her chest, but the metal bar around her neck prevented even that minimum amount of relief. At least the rain would wash away the streams of cum running down the insides of her thighs. This was her last thought before she drifted into a merciful unconsciousness.

“It has been seven hours, commander,” a dutiful corporal reminded Alex, as he had been instructed to do. “The Chinese spy... the woman outside... perhaps she will be more cooperative now.” The man could not conceal his grin while anticipating what was in store for their hapless prisoner.

“We shall see,” Alex responded flatly. “Bring her in and string her up in Room 3.”

“Yes sir.” The corporal nodded at one of the other guards and together they went outside to remove Ragna from her restraints. Drenched and breathing in sputtering gasps, she dropped to the muddy ground before the two men lifted her by the arms and dragged her through the door.

The inside of the Barn did not look at all barn-like. There were no stalls or hay bales or dirt covered floor. Of course there were no animals, nor was there the smell of manure one would expect in a traditional farm building. Instead, the interior was relatively tidy, albeit under-lit, with a central chamber surrounded by four smaller rooms, one in each corner of the structure. The floor was made of granite slabs, and rough wooden paneling covered the walls. The ceiling was only about fifteen feet high, as a stairway between two of the rooms led to a second story above.

Hauling Ragna’s limp body between the unconcerned occupants of the main chamber, the two soldiers pulled her into the room which had a large number 3 neatly stenciled on the door. As one of the men held her upright, the other used a wall-mounted switch to lower a chain from an overhead winch. The first man wrapped a length of twine repeatedly around Ragna’s wrists and after completing over a dozen loops, tied the ends off tightly, leaving her arms bound together above her head.

A large metal hook fastened to the end of the chain was pulled under the twine circling Ragna’s wrists. The man supporting her let her go, leaving her to drop down until the hook snagged the bindings. For a moment, Ragna hung partially suspended by her arms, her knees bent and her upper body drooping forward. This soon changed as the guard operating the winch pushed the switch in the opposite direction, pulling the chain and hook upwards – along with Ragna. He continued raising the chain until Ragna’s feet dangled several inches above the granite floor.

With their captive completely suspended, their job was done, so they stepped back to await the arrival of Alex – and to savor the enticing sight of Ragna’s naked body dangling from the chain, her smooth skin glistening wet and spattered with mud, her arms stretched tightly toward the ceiling. The pain in her shoulders must have been quite severe, but somehow she remained blissfully unaware of her predicament.

Alex entered Room 3 a short while later. Wearing only tight jeans and tan work boots, he was stripped to the waist, displaying a buff torso and swelling biceps. He walked up to the slack, hanging body of Ragna and inspected the men’s handy-work. He eyed her up and down carefully before kicking at her feet and causing her to sway from the chain. As her dangling legs swung freely, Alex turned to the guards with a disapproving look.

“When she comes to, I should have you stand in front of her so she can kick you in the balls,” he said. One of the men reacted quickly, using another length of twine to lash Ragna’s ankles together. Just to be safe, he knotted more strands around her toned thighs as well.

“My apologies sir,” he said before stepping out of the way.

Alex nodded, indicating the oversight had been resolved. He pulled the tape from around Ragna’s eyes and removed the socks which covered them. There was no response. Her lids were closed, and if any additional light were filtering through them, it was not enough to revive her. Alex was about to remove the tape which held her panties in her mouth, but after a quick glance at the two other men in the room, he seemed to change his mind and left the gag in place. Instead, he picked up a large syringe from a table covered with a variety of menacing implements, and positioned the needle against the side of Ragna’s left breast.

“So sorry, bitch,” he said under his breath, “This is the second time I have had to jab you today...” Alex pushed all two inches of the thin metal shaft into Ragna’s flesh, then depressed the plunger until the contents of the tube had been injected into her. In less than a minute, she began to move her head slowly, groaning as she gradually became conscious of her suffering.

“It is a powerful stimulant,” Alex explained to the guards. “We must ensure not only that she revives, but that she remains cognizant as the session proceeds.”

Ragna blinked as if the dim illumination in the interrogation room was blazing sunlight. Once her eyes adjusted, she stared blankly at Alex before emitting muffled, unintelligible sounds which he assumed were mumbles of protest. She shook her body as much as her restraints would allow, but quickly stopped when she noticed that doing so only exacerbated the cutting pain in her shoulders. Ragna soon realized that both physical and verbal defiance were futile, and weakly let herself droop from the overhead chain.

“Very good,” said Alex. “At last we can begin. The only reason you are still alive, Miss Ragna, is that you have information that I want you to share with me. Only one simple thing – that is all: why are Chinese operatives infiltrating the East Bloc? Once I remove the tape covering your mouth and pull out your shredded panties, you will answer that question. Do you understand?”

Ragna shivered. She nodded vigorously.

“Excellent. Because if you do not tell me what I want to know, you can be assured that you will suffer like no woman... no, let me correct that... like no human being has suffered before. Your ordeal will continue until you talk, and mark my words, in time you will. Only then will I release you from your torment by killing you. Of course, you can lessen your anguish considerably by answering my question truthfully right away. Your death will come sooner, but with far less distress than if you choose to resist. Again, do you understand?”

Ragna started nodding again, even more earnestly than before.

“Then it seems we are on common ground.” Alex walked to the table of apparatus and returned with the simplest of torture implements, a whip. However, unlike the leather-lashed variety, this knout sprouted a half dozen strands of barbed wire from its handle, each one over a four feet long. Alex held it up to Ragna’s face so she could appreciate the unique design of the device... and so she could imagine what it might do to her lush, feminine body. Despite her gag, she let out a most audible gasp.

As if suddenly remembering them, Alex turned to the guards. “You two... out.” He motioned to the door.

“But our orders are to remain with the session leader and assist as needed,” said one of the men, clearly disappointed that he might miss Ragna’s interrogation. “This is highly unorthodox...”

“Corporal, must I remind you that I am a senior officer, and that I have the authority to revise standard procedure at will?”

“No sir,” the second man replied before his querulous comrade got them both into serious trouble. The pair quickly obeyed orders and scurried out of the room.

“Now then, where were we?” Alex returned his attention to Ragna. “Oh yes, I was about to give you the opportunity to speak to me.” He lowered the heinous whip and raised his free hand to unravel the remaining tape circling Ragna’s head.

Alex stared at the striking woman while suggestively stroking the handle of the whip. He took a minute to admire her lithe body and exotic features, pleased that Nikolai had thought to ask for such an attractive emissary. It would make his job much more enjoyable. Alex watched Ragna squirm and gasp in obvious discomfort. Though no longer gagged, she seemed afraid to speak.

“What’s wrong, Miss Ragna?” he said. “Are you in pain?”

“My shoulders...” she wheezed. “It hurts. Can't you at least lower the chain so my feet can touch the floor... please...”

“I could,” Alex replied callously. “But I won't. You see, I want you to be in pain. It gives me pleasure – and more importantly, it will motivate you to cooperate. But don't worry... you soon will forget the ache in your shoulders when you experience stimulation that is much more – how shall I put it? – invigorating.”

Chapter 9

Renshu, a compact but muscular man, walked to the far side of the basement and returned pushing a rolling cabinet about the size and shape of a bar fridge. He opened it to display an array of power tools.

“Just about everything needed to complete most home renovation projects,” he said with a laugh. Anya shivered. From his collection, Renshu lifted a cordless nail gun. “I recommend we use this. It fires 16 gauge finishing nails – not big enough to kill, but definitely capable of causing a formidable amount of discomfort. I have had quite good success using it lately.”

“Very well,” said Wen. “You're the expert.” She was eager to resume interrogation duties after being shown up by Meng, so she decided to agree with Renshu’s suggestion. She quickly glanced at her superior to ensure this was acceptable, and after getting no indication that it wasn't, she took her place in front of her seated and terrified subject.

“As a Soviet agent, I'm sure you know how this works.” Wen’s voice was calm but forceful. “I will ask you a question, and if your answer is unacceptable, you will suffer at the hands of Renshu, who, I might add, is very skilled at inflicting pain to stubborn young bodies – particularly beautiful ones like yours.” “First question... do you work for Nikolai?” Wen asked, speaking slowly.

“No... I told you. I'm just a prostitute. Nikolai hired me. You said you believed me before – and now, just because that... that witch... made me admit I can't remember what I earned five years ago, you think I'm some kind of spy? Please... I'm telling the truth!” Anya was clinging to the remote possibility that Wen still had doubts, despite Meng breaking her cover. She could tell the two women did not like each other, and she hoped she could use that to her advantage.

“Stupid bitch. Do you expect me to believe you after that feeble performance you gave?” It seemed that despite her differences with Meng, Wen was not about to disagree with her boss, certainly not while the woman still was watching the interrogation. “Renshu, you may begin.”

Renshu pressed the nail gun against Anya’s right shoulder and pulled the trigger. There was a loud crack, almost like a gunshot, then a second of silence before Anya reacted.

“Yeeeaaaaaahhh!!!” she shrieked as the pain overwhelmed her. Renshu removed his tool to reveal that half of a one inch nail had been imbedded in Anya’s shoulder. A narrow stream of blood was already running down the length of her arm. Renshu jiggled the exposed half of the nail, causing Anya to scream again.

“I think we can go deeper,” he said and turned the adjustment dial further.

“Please!! I'm not a Soviet agent... I don't work for Nikolai... Why won't you believe me? I'm just a whore!” Anya broke into sobs, but stubbornly stuck to her story. She feared if she admitted lying, her ordeal would become even worse.

“Again!” Wen nodded at Renshu. “In the tit this time. Make her suffer!”

“NOOO!! Not there!” Anya howled as her tormentor placed the gun against her right breast, just above the nipple. There was another resounding crack, followed once again by a wailing cry from Anya. This time, the nail was completely buried in the woman’s flesh, easily piercing the soft tissue. There was a brief spray of blood from the puncture, and soon another crimson stream meandered along Anya’s curves.

“God... noooo!! Please stop!! Please!!”

“Then talk!”

“I... I... can't... I can't!”

“Won't, not can't. Another one,” Wen ordered Renshu, who fired a second nail into Anya’s ample bosom, this one an inch below the last – directly into her nipple. There was another squirt of blood; another scream of anguish; and another red rivulet from the wound.

“Tell me who you work for!!” Wen’s voice became considerably louder as her frustration grew. Still stinging from Meng’s disparaging remark, she was desperate to prove that she could be as good an interrogator as any of her peers. Yet this obstinate slut seemed determined to thwart her. Wen fought to control her anger, but when Anya refused to respond further, she could no longer conceal her rage.

“Stubborn fucking cunt!!” she yelled. “Renshu... two more... on the other side!”

Renshu sighed and moved around the chair before pushing the nail gun against Anya’s left breast.

Chapter 10

“Stop!! Please stop!! No more... I'll tell you... everything... everything I know!!”

The first stroke of the whip had been enough to break Ragna’s resolve. The barbed wire tentacles had wrapped around her midriff and made short work of shredding the outer layers of skin, leaving shallow cuts from below her breasts to just above her exposed sex. It felt as if six serrated knives had been simultaneously slashed from one side of her body to the other, ripping into her flesh and leaving uneven, bloody lacerations. The pain was staggering. Ragna knew she could take no more of such torture.

Minutes earlier, after the two guards left the room, Alex had removed Ragna’s gag so she could reveal what he wanted to know. Even before he raised his weapon to administer the first lash, she began jabbering, trying desperately to negotiate her way out of what was sure to become a hideous and likely fatal experience. She felt betrayed by her own people – Wen and the agency bosses had effectively forced her on a suicide mission – so she felt no desire now to display loyalty in the face of death. They had gotten her into this mess, so they might as well bear some of the consequences, she rationalized.

Ragna began with the obvious – offering her body and consensual sex in a futile attempt to appeal to Alex’s baser appetites. She knew the ploy was unlikely to succeed, but felt it was worth a try, if only to stall for time. She did her best to writhe seductively while hanging in mid air, but it only left Alex laughing at her pitiful come-on.

“If I want to fuck you,” he said with a grin, “it sure won't be on your initiative. And it would be just as agonizing for you as being tortured – so you can save the cute stripper act. Besides, in case you hadn't noticed, the only thing that we have left to strip from you is your flesh.”

“Then let me tell you something you want to find out.” Ragna was grasping at straws to avoid the whip. “Obviously, I work for the Chinese and even though I'm a low ranking operative, I might know something of value. Just release me, or at least lower me so I can stand up... and then we can discuss...”

“A tempting offer,” Alex interrupted, “but I like my way better. It ensures that you won't try to deceive me because, if I catch you in a lie, you will understand how severe the penalty will be.”

“But... but... there’s no need to...” Ragna stuttered as she watched in horror as Alex raised the whip and expertly administered the first stroke. She screamed of course, louder than she had ever screamed before, and then she gave in to her captor, begging him to stop, offering to answer any question he asked. For a moment Alex said nothing. The room was silent except for the sound of Ragna’s blood dripping to the floor beneath her feet.

“Good,” Alex said at last. “I like a cooperative subject. You might be surprised that we already know a great deal about you, Miss Ragna – something to think about as you respond to my queries, as I will be aware of any attempts to mislead me. Each time you play games, I will add a lash to the number you received previously. The next time you disappoint me, you will feel two strokes, and after that, three, then four... I'm sure you get the picture, though I doubt you can begin to fathom what will happen to your body – and your mind – should you try to outwit me.”

“I swear... I... I'll answer truthfully.” Ragna’s high, cracking voice sounded like that of a little girl promising her parents she'll behave.

“I already know that you work for the Chinese Ministry of State Security, and that MSS is attempting to leverage Soviet destabilization to annex key Bloc territories, specifically East Berlin. We have been monitoring Communist Chinese activity in East Germany, and despite your perception that Soviet intelligence is waning under Gorbachev’s reforms, it is stronger than ever – just less conspicuous. You can see how that works to our advantage.”

In fact, Ragna knew little of her country’s plans to stake out claims in East Europe. True, she was an MSS agent, but like all third class field operatives, she was informed of only mission details that she absolutely needed to know, nothing more. The strategic elements of MSS operations were never revealed to her, let alone the overall objectives of the ministry. Ragna prayed that Alex would understand that any information she could offer him would be of little significance and limited to the scope of her work, and that he would quickly tire of torturing her. But then she shivered, realizing that when her torture ended, there would be only one thing left to do.

“You seem to know more than I do,” Ragna said innocently. “I doubt I will be able to tell you anything that your intelligence sources have not already uncovered...”

“You had better hope you are wrong about that. If you truly cannot tell me anything, then you are of virtually no use to me, and our relationship will be even shorter than I would have anticipated. That would prove most unfortunate for you.”

“But... but I want to help you. I'm not like those patriots who are willing to suffer... and... and die for their countries. I want to live. I can become a double agent. I can be useful to you. I have no loyalty to the people who sent me on this suicide mission. Just tell me what you want to know...”

“Let’s begin with your assignment,” said Alex, sounding somewhat bored. “Just to see if our narratives concur on the basic points.”

“Yes... yes...” Ragna was almost delighted that she could offer some information to her enemy. “A few days before the meeting with Nikolai, I was selected as the local MSS agent who would make the exchange. I had handled similar jobs in the past, so it seemed quite routine. My picture was sent to the KGB contact so Nikolai could recognize me, and after that it was just a matter of selecting a public site at which we could meet. Wen – my boss – and Nikolai were going to decide on a hotel the day before the swap.”

“And then...”

“Everything changed. Or maybe it didn't... I think Wen knew all along that the exchange was going to be on Nikolai’s terms, and what those terms were. The meeting would be at a private apartment, supposedly Nikolai’s. I was told to provide a false account number – at least initially. And I was to service the man... um... sexually. This was all very unorthodox, but as I was informed of the real plan only at the last minute, I had no choice but to follow orders – unless I was willing to sacrifice my job, and probably my life.”

“So far so good,” said Alex, twirling the whip to remind Ragna what awaited her if she tried to dupe him. “So why did your bosses select you for this task?”

“Wen told me that Nikolai had insisted the courier should be a woman,” Ragna replied hesitantly. “In hindsight, I suppose he also specified that she should be attractive... a cute face perhaps... a nice figure. There are a few female MSS operatives in East Berlin, but not many Chinese women have the sort of curves men like. I've been successful in this kind of assignment before.”

“So you were the only qualified candidate?”

“No. Wen is even more voluptuous than I am, but as a low ranking field agent, I am more... “

“Expendable?” Alex helpfully offered the word Ragna hesitated to use.

“That’s right. It was a risky mission, and I suppose losing me would produce the least liability for the ministry because I have no strategic knowledge. Just like I'm trying to tell you.”

“That makes sense. Of course, low rank and low pay does not encourage dedication and loyalty. Is that why you are so eager to give up your secrets after just one stroke of the whip? I'll bet Wen would not have been nearly as forthcoming as you are.” Alex enjoyed goading his victims.

“No, it’s not that.” Ragna spoke in her defense. “I'm angry because they tricked me. They knew I would have protested the assignment if Wen had told me the plan at the beginning. But they waited till it was too late... and then they were willing to send me to my death without a second thought. They can go to hell for all I care. I'm not protecting some ridiculous scheme to breach East Berlin after what they did to me!”

“Ah... so you know something about the global MSS objectives after all...”

“No... No! I'm just repeating what you told me. I had no idea why I was supposed to make the exchange. I was ordered to offer the account number for the names of the seven agents.” Ragna paused briefly. “Well, that... and to fuck Nikolai. I didn't ask why – though I didn't need to know why the bastard wanted to screw me.”

“Do you know who the seven agents are?” Alex asked. “Weren't you curious why they were worth two million dollars to your employer?”

“I'm always curious, but like I already told you, anything I don't need to know...”

“Yes, yes...” Alex sighed. “... your superiors don't tell you. But couldn't you infer something on your own? You're a smart girl. You must have at least made a few guesses based on what you heard from your fellow agents... from other assignments you've had in Berlin...” Alex raised the whip and dangled it threateningly.

“I... I don't know!” Ragna squeaked. “I was given the three names we already had... and... and the account number. All that... and everything about my assignment... you already know this. I can't tell you anything else!”

“Bullshit!!” Alex yelled and sent the whip tearing across Ragna’s hips. The barbed wire slashed into her upper thighs, lower abdomen, and ripped into her gently bulging pubic area. Ragna screamed in anguish as drops of blood splattered in all directions.

Before she could recover, Alex had walked behind her suspended body and delivered the promised second blow – this one to her buttocks. The knout dug deep, lacerating the woman’s backside and leaving a pattern of rough striations from one side to the other. Ragna gasped for air, then let out another ear-splitting cry. Dozens of thin, red runnels trickled down both the front and back of her shapely legs.

“Does that help you think of something else?” Alex shouted at her. “Next time... you'll get three of those!”

“I... I... please...” Ragna sputtered. She wanted to say “I don't know” but even while experiencing the incredible pain of Alex’s assault, she knew that would not be wise. Instead, she grasped desperately at any information she could think of. “They were Russian! Their names... I could tell by their names... So I knew the assignment was about identifying Soviet spies... I wondered why the KGB was giving up its own agents... for... for money. It didn't make sense... Something was wrong...”

“Very good!” Alex pretended to be impressed. “But once again you are telling me things I obviously know already. Tell me why your people wanted the names! Why was MSS willing to pay two million for a list of seven Soviet KGB operatives?”

Ragna wanted nothing more than to answer him – anything to escape further strokes of the whip. She did not think she could survive any more of such torture. But Alex’s question did not make sense to her. Why would the Russians not know the value of the names they were selling? The transaction itself was odd enough, but she had never thought to question the reasons behind it.

“Because... because... they were moles!” she blurted out. It was the only response she could come up with. The only one that was even remotely logical.

“Wrong answer, bitch!!” Alex bellowed and raised the lash once again. This time, he brought the steel pronged strands down on Ragna’s chest, shredding the smooth skin of her bountiful breasts. Once again, the unfortunate agent’s blood sprayed through the air, followed by her now familiar high-pitched wail. Alex found the results of this attack so gratifying that he chose to lay all three strokes across the woman’s beautiful bust.

As Ragna’s screaming continued unabated, he landed the second slash across her breasts, this one even more powerful than the first. And then, swinging in the opposite direction, he tore into her a third time with a final flourish. When Alex was finished, Ragna’s once alluring bosom was covered with blood and bits of tattered flesh which hung grotesquely from what remained of her creamy skin. Both nipples had been torn asunder, and even the most skilled plastic surgeon would find it a challenge to return her breasts to their former splendor.

“Ghhhaaaaa...” Ragna uttered a doleful sound – part croak, part wheezing gasp. She wondered how she had remained conscious during such a vicious onslaught. The pain in her breasts was colossal, far beyond anything she had ever endured, but apparently the stimulant Alex had administered was doing its job well. She tried bending her toes to see if she still had any control of her body, but her attempt failed. She was no more than a hanging slab of meat – inanimate but lamentably still possessing sensory awareness.

“Let’s try again,” Alex said “What was so fucking important about those agents? Why were their names worth two million dollars.”

“I... I... don't... “ Ragna sobbed, knowing that admitting she couldn't answer the man was as bad as guessing incorrectly or not saying anything at all. Remaining silent required the least amount of energy, and since she had barely the strength to speak, that was the choice she made. Other than another feeble gasp, she did not make a sound.

“I'm beginning to think this whip kind of turns you on,” Alex sneered. Ragna struggled to raise her head enough to look pleadingly into his eyes. It was no use. Alex let his gaze run up and down her naked, scarlet-streaked body to find his next target. Once again, he sliced the barbed wire thongs into the soft flesh of his victim, the first of the four strokes to follow.

Chapter 11

Anya’s head lolled from side to side. Her breathing was labored. Her torso streaked with blood, she was swooning from the waves of agony which flooded her nervous system. But she remained steadfast, refusing to answer a single question Wen shouted at her.

“How many is that now?” Wen asked Renshu. She had lost track of the times he had fired the nail gun.

“Sixteen,” he replied. “One in the shoulder, two in the right tit, four in the left, five in the gut, two in each thigh.”

“And still she resists!” Wen said, both riled and somewhat in awe. “No ordinary woman could withstand such pain. She must be a Soviet agent! She must talk!”

“For your sake, let’s hope she does,” Meng threatened. It was clear she was growing impatient with Wen’s lack of progress.

“I thought you said this technique worked well,” Wen said to Renshu, trying to deflect some of the blame. He shrugged helplessly. “Perhaps you just haven't found the right target. Tell me Renshu, where is a woman most sensitive?”

“Her teeth?” he suggested, thinking back to some dental work he himself had undergone recently. Wen wanted to laugh, but maintained her serious demeanor.

“Based on that answer, I expect you are a most inexperienced lover,” Wen said dryly. Renshu blushed. “Otherwise, you would know exactly where the next nail should be fired.”

“Oh...” he said, finally understanding what Wen was talking about. “There... in the um...” his face glowed deeper red as he tried to explain.

“In her snatch you idiot!” Wen said, again letting her temper flare. “Harpoon her fucking clitoris!”

Renshu nodded. With his free hand, he reached between Anya’s spread thighs and nervously began searching for the desired quarry by fingering the top of her sex.

“Uuurrrggghh...” Anya groaned involuntarily as she felt the man clumsily probe inside her. Consumed with pain, at first she was barely aware of what he meant to do. But soon the haze of her suffering cleared enough for her to realize his intentions. When the word “clitoris” eventually registered in her consciousness, she quickly came to her senses.

“You fucking sadists!!” she yelled. “No!! Noooo!! Not there... Not... Ungggghhh...” Despite her panic and protests, Anya could not help but react when Renshu at last found what he was looking for. The tiny gland responded to his touch by swelling to twice its size and surfaced at the apex of its owner’s vagina. “Fuck... no... Unnnnggghh... God no.... no... noooo...” Anya blathered as she struggled to restrain what for her was an autonomic response she could not possibly suppress.

With his objective in plain sight, Renshu quickly moved the nail gun into position. It was surprisingly easy for him to trap the small lump of flesh directly under the muzzle. He pushed down on the device and began to squeeze the trigger.

“Noooo!!!” Anya screamed. She writhed against her bonds, but she could not escape the impending peril.

“Talk... or lose it!!” Wen barked. She waited longer than usual for a response from her subject, but when it became clear that even the prospect of losing her source of sexual pleasure was not enough to persuade her to cooperate, Wen had no choice but to follow through on her threat. “Do it,” she ordered Renshu.

Not surprisingly, Anya’s scream was louder than the previous sixteen, the pathetic cries which followed the other nails being pumped into her body. Though the projectile was relatively small, it was enough to impale the young woman’s clit and ultimately rupture it like a diminutive boil. Along with its obliteration, the eight thousand nerves which lined its interior sent out one final, boundless blast of torment to signal their excruciating demise.

It proved to be too much for poor Anya, who blacked out almost instantly. She slumped in her bonds and her head fell backwards, eyes closed and mouth agape.

“Well, so much for that idea,” said Wen, glaring sullenly at Renshu, who stood with a sheepish expression, still holding the nail gun which had failed him.

“I could have told you as much,” said Meng, “but you didn't ask my opinion.” It was clear she was as unimpressed as ever with Wen’s efforts. “Your subject obviously is a highly trained spy... one who knows how to withstand incredible amounts of torture. Have you considered sending her image to headquarters to see if we have her on file?”

“Umm... I did not think that would be necessary. I assumed she would talk,” said Wen contritely, realizing she had made another error. “I will do so now.”

“And while you're at it,” Meng continued, “you might consider administering a double dose of sodium thiopental to loosen her tongue. No amount of training can alter a person’s neural susceptibility, and this woman seems quite susceptible to even the most incidental stimulation.”

Chapter 12

“My god, you did make a mess of her!” Nikolai looked at the limp, hanging body of Ragna. Not only was he amazed by the amount of damage Alex had inflicted on the woman, but he was impressed that he was able to do so without killing her.

After the last four strokes, Ragna had succumbed to unconsciousness. She hung silent, bloody and motionless from the chain suspending her. But she still lived.

A few minutes later, Nikolai had entered Room 3 to see if Alex had made any progress. Alex grinned.

“Indeed I have.” The impatience and annoyance he had displayed earlier were gone – apparently his threatening disposition had only been an act. “I'm quite sure she knows nothing.”

“So the MSS brass are playing their cards very close. They are not telling their field agents anything?”

“Nothing significant. In fact, I am certain that only Colonel Meng and the small contingent she oversees in East Berlin are aware of the exchange. She is playing this out to her own advantage – so she can be the first to reveal the double agents whose covers are blown. The garbled transmission I sent set the trap; the three names which were identifiable were the bait; and the complete list was the pay-off. For us, that’s two million dollars in a Swiss account.”

“But MSS has turned at least thirty KGB agents in East Berlin,” said Nikolai. “The Chinese would know that if any of the Soviets on their payroll are found out, our side would kill them and that would be the end of it.”

“Not exactly. Without MSS knowing which operatives were exposed, the KGB could force the traitors to relay false intelligence. Unless MSS has the names, any information transmitted by any of the double agents would be suspect. That would be a major stroke against their plans to infiltrate the East.”

Nikolai gave this some thought. “But that is exactly what our side will do. That is why the seven defectors have been rounded up and confined here. It is why we know who they are...”

“Of course,” Alex said with a grin. “That’s what inspired my plan in the first place. As long as the KGB remains unaware of our private enterprise operation, they will exploit the double crossing spies to trick the meddlesome Chinese, not knowing that any such efforts would be futile as soon as Meng releases the list.”

“A list she does not have,” Nikolai said, remembering that they had taken it from the pocket of Ragna’s dress before abducting her.

“Exactly. There is nothing she can do as we did not keep our part of the bargain. We have the money, but Meng does not have the names.”

“But I still worry that sooner or later, our plans will surface – these things usually do.” Nikolai had been hesitant to join in on Alex’s scheme at first, but the thought of getting a third of the money was just too tempting. Now he was beginning to have second thoughts. “How do we know Meng won't expose the plan?”

Alex tried to reassure him. “Meng took a gamble and she lost. For her own self interests, she overstepped her authority, so she’s not about to reveal her failure if she doesn't have to.”

“Then what about her operatives? They have less reason to stay silent.”

“Well, as this lovely young lady has so obligingly verified,” Alex said smugly, gesturing at Ragna’s body, “it seems very few people, even those reporting to Meng, are aware that this was an unsanctioned venture initiated by only three Soviet agents. Nonetheless, we must take care to cover up our tracks. Our work is not yet done.”

“And what about her?” Nikolai pointed at Ragna.

“She’s the only MSS agent who saw the list. It seems unlikely she would remember all the names, but why take the risk? In time, I will kill her. But she may still prove useful. For now we'll keep the bitch here.”

It was almost midnight. Alex turned off the lights as he and Nikolai left Room 3, leaving Ragna unconscious and still suspended by the overhead chain.

Chapter 13

“It certainly looks like her.” Wen studied the grainy surveillance pictures on the papers Sung had retrieved from the upstairs telecopier. “The physical details seem to be a match as well – height, weight, even her rather exceptional vital statistics.” She glanced up to examine the naked woman strapped to the chair. Secretly, Wen hoped to find some evidence that did not match the dossier transmitted from Shanghai – a mole or scar on their captive’s flawless face perhaps – but she had to admit there was little doubt. Once again, Wen had been proven wrong by Colonel Meng. If she had requested the transmission right away, they would have saved a lot of time.

“So who is she?” Meng asked impatiently. She nodded at Renshu, who was holding up the still unconscious woman’s head so Wen could identify her. He let go and it limply fell forward, her dark hair obscuring her features.

“She has over a dozen aliases, but officially we have her on file as Svetlana. No surname apparently, not that it matters.”

“KGB?”

“Quite likely, but there’s nothing solid in here other than that she always works with Soviet agents. The dossier classifies her as a runner, but it also warns that she’s frequently been the bait in honey trap operations.”

“Well, that makes sense,” Meng said with a sneer. “Those Cossacks know a good thing when they see it.”

“In any case, we can be pretty sure that she’s working with Nikolai and knows a lot more than she’s telling us.”

“Pretty sure?” Meng sighed. “What more do you want? We've got this bitch busted wide open – now we just need to scoop out the goods. Renshu... wake her up.”

The obliging interrogator grabbed Anya – now Svetlana – by the hair and again pulled her head up, this time letting it slump backwards so that she faced the ceiling. He balled his right hand into a fist and smashed it across her left jaw, snapping her head violently sideways. He then repeated the process with his other hand, striking the other side of her head and jerking it in the opposite direction.

Svetlana groaned as the sudden pain brought her out of her stupor. Renshu landed two more blows before his battered subject was fully conscious.

“Noooo... stop...” she moaned as she opened her eyes to see the man raise his hand a fifth time. Having done as instructed, he lowered his arm and stepped back.

“You can drop the lies, Soviet slut,” Wen said as the Russian woman groggily regained her bearings. “We know who you are... Svetlana.”

“No... nooo... it’s not true...” she whimpered. “Please believe me...”

“Jesus. This fucking cunt never gives up. Renshu... give her the drug.” Although she disdained taking Meng’s advice, Wen knew it would be foolish to ignore her superior. Besides, Meng most likely was right. Svetlana was a pro... and like most Soviet spies, she could resist most interrogation methods. She would die before giving in. Injecting her with sodium thiopental was their best option, even if it was risky. The dose needed to be high enough to loosen Svetlana’s tongue, but not so high as to knock her out or kill her.

“Double the usual,” Wen ordered, as that was Meng’s original suggestion. Given their subject’s youth and obvious physical strength, she guessed the woman could take it without becoming comatose. Renshu filled a syringe and plunged the needle into Svetlana’s neck, directly shooting the contents into her left jugular. It was not the most pleasant way to inject their prisoner, but it was the most efficient. The drug would take effect in only a few minutes.

Svetlana’s lurched as the steel penetrated her flesh. Her nail-filled breasts bounced on her chest and she let out a brief yelp, then looked up accusingly at her tormentors. “I won't... tell... you... anything...” she murmured in a halting voice. She shuddered and writhed as she fought to resist the effects of the serum. She knew what it was of course, and she braced herself to withstand its impact.

“This is you, isn't it?” said Wen, holding up one of the pictures in the dossier so Svetlana could see it. The woman just shook her head and looked away. She began to perspire more heavily, the streams of sweat mingling with the blood which trickled from the wounds left by the nails puncturing her body. She pulled against her bonds, squirming in the chair in a way that both the male and female onlookers found to be unintentionally erotic. When Svetlana began to moan in response to the drug deadening her nervous system, it was all Renshu could do to keep from reaching for his crotch.

After almost five minutes of struggling against the drug’s inevitable onslaught, Svetlana, naked and glistening, relaxed noticeably. Her pupils dilated and she stared glassy-eyed, but still conscious, at Wen. Her shoulders drooped and drool dribbled from the corners of her mouth.

“Now then,” Wen said, trying to hide her nervousness. “Admit that you are a Soviet spy!” She knew if Svetlana continued to lie or did not respond, then the consequences for her would be grave. But she also knew that if Svetlana did not talk, Meng’s method would have proved as useless as her own. Wen wasn't sure whether she preferred that Svetlana or Meng win this contest of wills. Wen waited almost a half minute for her prisoner to respond.

“Yesss... yessss...” Svetlana confessed, slurring her reply in a sleepy, almost orgasmic tone. “I am... I am a KGB agent...” Victory for Meng. Defeat for Svetlana. And for Wen.

Chapter 14

Ragna had no idea how much time had passed when she came out of her unconscious stupor. Her entire body throbbed with intolerable pain, especially her shoulders, which were almost dislocated by the constant pull of her suspended weight. Blood and perspiration trickled across her clammy skin, and despite the almost total darkness which surrounded her, she knew her captors had left her naked. She could not see the bruises and gashes which defiled her beauty, but she knew they were there.

“Even if I survive this hell,” she whispered to herself, “no man will ever want to fuck me again...”

Ragna groaned and stretched herself in hopes of touching the floor with her toes, but though tantalizingly close, the granite tiles remained out of reach. Yet as she squirmed in her bonds, she felt the sweat slicked skin of her wrists and hands slipping ever so slightly through the twine which tethered them. The rough cords cut into her flesh, drawing blood which added further lubrication. Ragna began twisting her wrists vigorously, trying to loosen the cords so she could pull her hands free.

“Yes... yes...” she said as she made slow and steady progress. The pain was intense, but she ignored it. She knew once her palms slid through the loops, she would be free – and that was worth the suffering. So when Ragna felt her hands snag just below her thumbs, thwarting her efforts, she made a desperate decision.

Calling on all her remaining strength, she pulled herself upward, grunting as the strain on her shoulders caused even more torment. Once her body was as high as she could lift it, almost two feet above the floor, Ragna let herself drop. She prayed the tactic would work, because she knew she did not have the energy to try it again. For a moment, Ragna’s fall snapped to an abrupt halt as her arms jerked taught just as her toes hit the floor. She shrieked in agony as she felt her left shoulder dislocate, then again as the twine yanked at her thumbs, spraining them both.

The sudden force of Ragna’s dropping body was enough to wrench her hands free of the twine, leaving her to fall to the floor with a fleshy thump. For a moment, she lay stunned, but she quickly regained her senses and began loosening the ropes around her ankles and thighs. With her injured thumbs all but useless, it was a frustrating task, but after many minutes she managed to slip off the remaining twine.

Ragna struggled to stand up, but after being strung up for so long, as well as being whipped repeatedly, she had difficulty maintaining her balance and collapsed back on the floor. She found herself sliding in her own blood, unable to get any traction on the slippery tiles. Complicating matters further, the room was so dark, she could not see whether there was anything nearby on which she could steady herself.

The only thing Ragna could make out for certain was a dim strip of light, which she knew to be coming in under the door. Since that was where she wanted to go, she decided to pull herself toward it, dragging her prone body along the floor. As a result of her dislocated shoulder, her left arm was of little help, but by pulling with her right and frog-kicking her legs, Ragna made slow progress writhing her blood-slicked torso forward.

At last she reached her goal and pulled herself up alongside the door. She groped for the handle in the darkness and found it.

“Christ... I hope that bastard didn't lock me in here,” she whispered to herself while pulling down the lever. There was an audible click and the latch released. Ragna sighed with relief. She opened the door just a crack and peered out, praying there was no one on the other side.

She saw the square chamber which formed the center of the Barn, and again to her relief, Ragna noted it was unoccupied. The windows revealed it was dark outside, and a clock on the far wall indicated it was just after 4:30. Apparently, there was no night shift, and the Russians who worked here had all gone home.

Ragna stepped into the main room and steadied herself against the wall, stumbling alongside it toward the building entrance. She noticed the doors to the three other corner cells were closed and wondered if anyone else was imprisoned as she had been. She decided it was best not to check.

Once she reached the main door, Ragna was discouraged to find it was locked. To make matters worse, the windows in the Barn were well secured with metal bars. There was no way out. Given the facility’s purpose, this was not surprising. In fact, even if she had managed to get outside, there likely were armed guards posted there. In her current state, naked and without a weapon, Ragna wouldn't stand a chance.

She cursed herself for not thinking her escape through more carefully. With nowhere to run, and with dozens of KGB workers returning in just a few hours, she was not only as trapped as she was in the cell, she would likely bear the brunt of Alex’s wrath for trying to escape. And then Ragna remembered the stairs leading up to the second floor of the building.

Not knowing what she would find there, she figured it was her only chance. Perhaps that area was less secure. Perhaps she would discover something, anything, to help her elude her captors. She turned to walk to the stairway, but once she moved away from the wall, Ragna once again lost her footing and collapsed. As before, she was forced to slither snake-like along the floor until she got to the stairs. With the aid of a banister, she stumbled her way to the top.

The second floor was dark, but Ragna could tell the ceiling was much lower than the one below. There was a single tiny window, and from what little she could make out in the dim moonlight it let in, the space resembled a cluttered attic. Cautiously feeling her way along some wooden paneling, Ragna eventually found a light switch. She flicked it on and a bank of overhead fluorescent fixtures came to life.

Less than two yards in front of her was what appeared to be a horizontal row of filing cabinets, though these were twice as wide as the ones found in most offices. There were seven drawers in total, side by side at waist height and mounted on a sturdy, steel pedestal. As she moved closer, Ragna noticed the cabinets were connected into a single large storage unit about seven feet deep. As with a normal filing cabinet, each of the oversized drawers could be pulled open by a metal handle, above which was a label presumably identifying the contents.

“Petrova, Ivana...” Ragna read the label of the third cabinet from the left and furrowed her brow. The name was familiar. She grabbed the handle and immediately released it, surprised by how cold it was. “It’s freezing! These drawers... they're ice boxes... or more likely...” Ragna suddenly realized the macabre purpose of the array of cabinets. She had seen similar ones before. At a morgue.

Again she grasped the handle, this time pulling on it and bracing herself for what she would find. The cabinet opened with surprising ease, quietly rolling out on lubricated bearings. Ragna exposed about two feet of the drawer and grew suddenly cold as the frigid air inside it escaped. As she expected, it contained a corpse.

The corpse belonged to a gorgeous woman, blonde, in her early thirties and with a magnificent body – at least what Ragna could see of it from the waist up. The dead beauty was naked, the flesh pale white in death, but otherwise very well preserved. The face was exquisite, like an alabaster carving of a Greek goddess. Ivana Petrova had been quite the beguiling creature when she was alive, Ragna thought.

But on closer inspection, she noticed that much of Ivana’s beauty had been marred and disfigured, divulging the brutal manner in which she had died. Though the victim’s face was perfectly intact, from the neck down her pallid skin was mottled with bruises and welts. Dozens of now bloodless puncture wounds revealed that her firm, high-thrust breasts had been repeatedly perforated by something akin to an ice pick. Both her nipples were missing, replaced by ragged craters of scabbed tissue. Ragna did not bother examining what had been done to Ivana from the waist down, but she easily could imagine.

One thing was for certain. Ivana Petrova had succumbed in agony.

And then Ragna remembered why the name seemed familiar. Ivana Petrova was on the list of names she had received from Nikolai. She had only glanced at it briefly, figuring the information to be of little importance to her – but now she wished she had taken more time to study it. No wonder there were seven cabinets. One for each of the Soviet agents. Could it be they were all dead? Tortured and killed like Ivana Petrova? But then why were their identities worth two million dollars to MSS? Did Wen and the others even know about this?

Ragna looked at the label on the cabinet to the left of Ivana’s. “Dolinskaya, Nika,” she whispered, again vaguely remembering the name from the list. “Another woman. I wonder if th...”

But before Ragna could finish her thought, she felt a sharp, sudden pain erupt at the base of her skull. For a few seconds her vision blurred and dimmed, and then it faded to total blackness.

Chapter 15

“Well... at last some progress,” Colonel Meng said, still betraying a note of condescension toward Wen. “The bitch finally admits to being a KGB agent. But we need more... much more. She still hasn't told us anything we don't already know.”

Wen controlled her growing anger at the colonel, instead channeling it at Svetlana. Meng may have thought Wen to be inept, but now that the subject was beginning to crack, she planned to prove her competence as an interrogator once and for all.

“So... Svetlana... you admit to being a KGB operative.” Wen’s voice was cold and assertive. “You were on a mission, correct?”

“Yesss...”

“You were working with Nikolai... Nikolai Durchenko, correct?”

“Yes. Yes... Nikolai...” Svetlana mumbled, her head lolling from side to side.

“And who else? Who are the others?”

Svetlana hesitated, fighting to resist the drug, but her efforts were futile. “Alex... Alex Kandinsky.”

Wen looked at Sung, who knew without being told that he should run a check on the name. “Who else? Who planned the operation? Who was in charge?”

“No... no one,” Svetlana sputtered. “No one else...”

“Bullshit!” Wen yelled. “The KGB doesn't send three agents into the field without at least twice that many supervisors coordinating the mission from headquarters. Give me more names! Give me the division you work for!”

Svetlana just stared blankly at Wen.

“Renshu...” Wen nodded at the burly attendant. She did not need to say more. With full force, he slapped Svetlana six times across the face. Her head snapped from one side to the other with each blow. When he was done, a trickle of blood rolled from the corner of her lips.

“Names!” shouted Wen.

“Fuck you...” Svetlana replied in a low, derisive tone.

Renshu balled his hands into fists and prepared to pummel Svetlana even harder. But before he could throw a punch, Wen raised her hand, signaling him to stop.

“We know that pain will not persuade her. For all we know, the Soviets trained her to enjoy physical abuse. Get another vial of the drug and let’s give her one more dose.”

“But...” Renshu began.

“Don't worry. This bitch can take it.”

While Renshu left to obey Wen’s command, Sung returned with the dossier on Alex. Wen looked at the man’s profile, clearly unimpressed.

“Alex Kandinsky,” she read aloud. “Senior Lieutenant. Seventh Directorate. Last stationed in East Berlin. F Division... responsible for monitoring MSS intelligence... pretty standard resume for a surveillance expert who sits at a desk compiling intel when he’s not forcibly extracting it from unfortunate detainees and double agents. Not someone you'd find on a field mission, and not someone who could authorize one.”

“I'm... I'm telling you the truth. It was just the three of us.” It was more than Svetlana wanted to say, but she remained at the mercy of the sodium thiopental.

Renshu returned with another vial of the drug, enough for two more doses. “It’s all we got,” he said filling the syringe with half the contents. He positioned the needle against Svetlana’s neck and prepared to inject her.

“No...” Wen stopped him and took the hypodermic from his hand. She moved it down, centering the tip over the woman’s left nipple. The right one had already been punctured by one of the nails, but its mate had escaped unscathed... until now. Wen wasn't trying to induce more pain, but if she had the option, she would cause her subject as much discomfort as possible – particularly if it involved punishing her tits.

Wen pushed hard on the syringe, stabbing the needle in as far as she could and pushing on the plunger so Svetlana’s breast was flattened against her chest.

“Gggaaaaaagghh!!” she screamed, before wheezing audibly when her tormentor had finally drained the barrel and pulled out the needle. She continued to moan, occasionally letting out incoherent murmurs, but Svetlana was as unaccommodating as ever.

“I think you may have gone too far,” scolded Meng, ever the pessimist.

“No.... give her some time... she'll come around...” Wen bit her lip. For a minute there was silence, then Svetlana seemed to rally somewhat.

“Three... there was just... just three of us. It... it was Alex’s idea...” Svetlana swooned, her inhibitions gone.

“Of course...” Wen finally believed her, realizing the KGB had nothing to do with the scheme. “You were after the money. You, not the agency, wanted to sell the list! The three of you would pocket a quick two million, and if the names never got out, MSS would be left holding the bag and no one would be the wiser!”

“Yesss...” Svetlana’s pupils were so dilated, her irises were almost completely black. “Money... we did it for... the money. Nikolai worked out... the deal... with his Berlin MSS contact... in... in secret. Alex needed me because... because I looked like... like Ragna...”

“I know... I know that,” Wen shook Svetlana impatiently. “But what about the seven double agents... the operatives on the list... who are they? Tell me the names!” A long silence followed.

“Don't know... I... I never saw the list...”

“Fuck!” Wen shouted. Of course it couldn't be that easy. “Then tell me where I can find Alex... or Nikolai. Where are they now? And where did they take Ragna? Talk bitch!”

“Barn... the Barn...”

“What barn? Where? Tell me!”

“Don't know... never... never been there... outside... outside the city... somewhere...” Svetlana swayed from side to side, her eyes rolling back in her head.

“No... don't give up on me now you cunt! Where outside the city? North... south... east... west? How far? You must know!! You worked with these guys.”

“D... don't... know...” Svetlana’s head suddenly drooped forward, her energy all but depleted. “Meeting... meeting tom... tomorrow... gghaaa....” Her breath rattled and her body went limp.

“Meeting? What meeting? Where? Talk! TALK!!” Wen shook her subject but there was no response. In frustration she gestured at Renshu. “Give her the rest of the sodium thiopental. I'm sure she can tell us more!”

“Another dose? I don't know. She may not be able to tell us anything after that.” Renshu looked at Meng for confirmation, but the colonel just shrugged.

“Give me that!” Wen grabbed the vial from Renshu and siphoned the remaining drug into the syringe. Once again she plunged it into her subject’s breast. Svetlana coughed and sputtered. She quivered for ten seconds, and then went still, her naked body awkwardly slumping forward in the chair. Wen waited for another few minutes, desperately hoping the woman would revive once more. In time, a mixture of bile, blood and saliva dribbled from her mouth and down her cleavage. A surge of urine erupted from between her legs as her bladder emptied involuntarily.

Wen sighed. If her subject still lived, Renshu was right... she wouldn't be revealing much more at this point.

“I've had enough of this charade!” Meng’s huffy outburst broke the silence. Drawing her side arm, she strode up to Svetlana and raised the weapon to the captive’s head. Without hesitating, Meng pushed the gun’s barrel into the woman’s mouth, using it to straighten her neck, then Meng pulled the trigger. There was a deafening bang as a spray of blood cascaded from between Svetlana’s lips, and the back of her skull was sent flying against the wall behind her in a gore-soaked blast. For the briefest moment, her eyes went wide as the shock of being shot startled her out of her drugged stupor. But in less than a second, the Soviet agent was dead.

With the muzzle of Meng’s gun still lodged between her lips, Svetlana’s head remained upright, her open eyes gazing forward lifelessly. Meng waited for almost ten seconds before finally pulling her weapon from the woman’s mouth, leaving her perforated head to slump back onto her chest. As the others looked on in stunned silence, nothing could be heard but the sound of blood, piss and other bodily fluids dripping to the floor.

At last, Meng turned to look at Sung. “Take this useless cunt’s carcass and dump it in the acid tank at the factory... I assume you know the place. Make sure there’s nothing left of the fat-jugged whore.”

Without another word or even a glance at Wen, Colonel Meng walked purposefully up the stairs and left the basement.

Chapter 16

“Thanks for taking care of her... and for calling me right away,” said Alex as he entered the large upstairs room at the Barn. “It’s a good thing you were the first one to arrive today.”

“Yeah, I was having trouble sleeping so I drove here really early to check up on the little wench,” Nikolai replied. “As soon as I got in the building I knew something was wrong. Blood smears on the walls and floor... leading right to the steps. It was obvious she'd slipped free somehow and came up here. She was looking at... this...” he added, nodding toward the open drawer containing the body of Ivana Petrova. “Before she could turn around I clocked her from behind.”

With the toe of his boot, Nikolai nudged Ragna, who was sprawled at his feet, face down and naked.

“Looks like you really belted her a good one.” Alex pointed at the large bruise on the woman’s neck. “She'll be out for a while, but we'd better secure her. Help me lift the bitch onto that table and let’s get her tied down.” Together, the two men hoisted Ragna by the arms and legs, placed her on a stainless steel table and flipped her onto her back. From a nearby foot locker, Alex removed two rolls of duct tape and handed one to Nikolai.

“You do the hands. I'll do the feet.” Alex crouched down and bent Ragna’s knees over the bottom edge of the table. Using the tape, he began fastening her ankles to two of the legs. Nikolai stretched her arms over her head and pulled on Ragna’s body until he could bend her elbows over the upper edge. He too squatted to bind her wrists to the remaining legs in the same fashion.

“What about the mess downstairs?” asked Nikolai as he tore off a length of tape. “People will begin showing up in an hour or two.”

“Don't worry. I've stationed a guard at the door. When folks arrive, he'll explain that there’s been an emergency in the building and reroute everyone to Quonset 2 for the day. It’s Friday, so there likely won't be more than a dozen staff coming in. We'll have lots of time to clean up and deal with our little runaway here.”

“And this?” Nikolai motioned to the large storage unit containing the dead agents. “I haven't been up here in a while, but my understanding was we were using this room to, ummm... persuade the pretty darlings to leak false information, not to execute them. What gives? Did you get new instructions from HQ? Why didn't you tell me?”

“No new instructions, my friend... but yes, as you can tell, there has been a change of plans.”

“So you've killed all of them?”

“All but one. We're still looking for Valentina Toporkoa.”

“All tortured... to death. But HQ said to keep them alive and not to leave any marks – that no one should suspect they had been coerced.” Nikolai wrinkled his brow. “If you didn't get revised orders, that means you're...”

“That’s correct. It’s another rogue operation.” Alex smiled. Both men had finished taping Ragna’s limbs, leaving her trussed and spread out on the metal surface. They stood up. Nikolai moved to the side of the table and casually stroked the Chinese agent’s body, shaking his head slowly. He handed the remaining tape to Alex, who walked to the foot locker to return both rolls.

“But you should have told me,” Nikolai said, sounding worried. “This changes everything. If you'd left the original plan as it was – just done your job torturing the girls into turning back and releasing bogus intel to the Chinese – then we'd be done now. All we'd have left to do is get rid of this bitch. The KGB wouldn't know anything went down, and since we conned Meng, we can be sure she won't talk. Neither will the few other MSS agents who might have been in on this... they don't want to jeopardize their careers, or more likely their lives, by revealing they've been duped.”

“Yes, it was a good plan,” Alex conceded. “And we did pocket two million dollars. But unfortunately for these traitorous KGB beauties, they are worth even more to me dead.”

“You?” Alex’s brow furrowed more. “I thought we were in on this together. You, me and Svetlana...”

“Quite right... we were in on it together,” replied Alex, emphasizing the past tense. “But now it is time for me to work independently.” While putting away the tape, Alex reached into the foot locker and withdrew a semi-automatic pistol which he pointed squarely at Nikolai.

“But Alex...” it was all Nikolai could say before Alex quickly fired five rounds into his chest. Nikolai stood for a moment, his expression a mixture of surprise and confusion, then he fell forward. Bending at the waist as his upper body landed on top of Ragna’s nude torso, his head cushioned against her whip-shredded left breast. Alex laughed, figuring it was a fitting farewell for the sex obsessed Nikolai.

He replaced the gun in the storage locker, then headed back to the main floor, making sure to lock the door to the upstairs room just in case. People working at the Barn were used to seeing dead bodies in the building – in fact many had probably seen the accumulating female corpses without knowing who they were -- but Ragna was still alive and he wanted to keep her that way for now. Yet at the moment he had other matters to attend to. He would deal with the Chinese agent later.

First he needed to clean up Ragna’s blood so there was no evidence of her escape. Next he had to deal with Svetlana. He would make sure that she – unlike Nikolai – was dead before she discovered that the plan to fleece the Chinese was proceeding toward another goal... a goal that did not include her. The thought of killing Svetlana made Alex smile.

He had only known the dark-haired bitch with the big tits for two days, but he disliked her from the beginning. Nikolai was loyal. He had called Alex rather than his KGB boss when he found Ragna had freed herself. But Svetlana was different... she'd squeal the minute she sensed anything was awry. Then she'd find some way of covering her own ass. And once she found out that Nikolai was dead, she'd know she was next in line and turn on Alex in a heartbeat.

It took Alex less time than he expected to wipe up the evidence of Ragna’s escape. It didn't have to be a perfect job. In a building dedicated to torture, bloodstains were not that unusual – though it was understood that most of the messy stuff should be confined to the interrogation cells so as not to upset staff working in the central chamber. Alex managed to finish before sunrise, and left the Barn before any of the workers had arrived.

He reminded the security guard at the door to make sure no one entered the building, then drove home. While preparing their scheme, the threesome had agreed to meet the following day at an isolated warehouse on the north side of the city. It was where Alex originally had intended to kill both his partners. That was before Nikolai discovered the makeshift morgue, thereby expediting his own termination.

Now Alex had to deal with only Svetlana. She would be at the warehouse at ten o'clock, presenting a perfect opportunity for Alex to do away with his remaining co-conspirator. She would be an easy target. All he needed to do was decide on how to get the job done.

He armed himself with a side arm, a knife and, a garrotte, leaving the decision of which to use for when he was on his way to meet her. Alex wished he had more time to make the woman’s demise as slow as possible, but it would be risky to draw out Svetlana’s death just to appease his personal desires.

Still, as he drove his Mercedes to their planned rendezvous, he fantasized about killing her by destroying whatever physical attribute she most valued. She had a beautiful face, but one which permanently wore a smug expression which irritated Alex whenever he looked at her. And then there were those breasts she was so proud of. Maybe he would use his knife on them. Or perhaps he would slowly draw the garrotte tight around her slender neck.

But it was Svetlana’s face he thought about most. He decided he would destroy her beauty and wipe away that haughty look simultaneously.

“That’s it,” he said to himself. “I'll just stick my gun in her mouth and blow her fucking head off.”

Chapter 17

”You didn't have to kill her yet. I'm sure she would have told us more if I'd had another hour.” Wen had followed Colonel Meng to the first floor of the Yellow House, where Meng had decamped to a spare room she had converted into an office. Seated behind a large oak desk, she was as intimidating as ever.

Standing on the other side of the desk, Wen bravely confronted her superior about the way Meng had ended the interrogation. In fact, she wanted to bring up a number of her concerns regarding the failed operation. But it was clear Meng did not want to discuss anything with her subordinate. She felt the accusations and questions being leveled at her to be disrespectful and insolent. Still, Meng chose to humor Wen in order to find out what the woman was thinking.

“Your questioning produced only the thinnest information that could be considered useful,” Meng replied. “What we needed most was the names of the seven Soviet agents, and it was clear that Svetlana never saw the list. Why should she have? She was selected by Nikolai and Alex because she resembled Ragna. Her only purpose was to impersonate our courier so they could swindle us. Your continued attempts to get more out of her were a waste of time... and by injecting Svetlana with four doses of sodium pentathol, you pretty much sealed her fate.”

“She mentioned a meeting... it may have been with Alex and Nikolai...”

“Delirious raving,” said Meng with a wave of her hand. “In her condition, nothing she said was reliable.”

“But she told us where Ragna was taken. We should at least try to find this ‘barn’ she mentioned.”

“How? The KGB bitch had never been there. She had no specific address to give us... she didn't even know what side of the city it was on. Besides, your friend Ragna is most certainly dead by now. We knew it was unlikely that she would survive the mission.”

“It was you who chose her, wasn't it?” Wen asked. Despite knowing the answer, she wanted to hear Meng’s reasons directly from her. “Why? You could have selected someone more experienced... someone who had a better chance of evading capture.”

“She was a D-grade agent, and an expendable one. More importantly, Ragna had the, um... physical qualifications required by the Soviets, and she had experience using her sexual wiles on the job. To be brutally honest... she wasn't very smart, she was willing to fuck, and she had big boobs. Would you rather I had sent you?”

Wen blushed. She too possessed the required physical attributes – even more so than Ragna – but as much as she liked Ragna, she was grateful she had not been given the perilous assignment herself.

“No,” she said softly.

“Very well,” Meng said curtly. “Will there be anything else?”

“Only that I will need to complete my report.” Wen’s voice wavered. “Given what you have told me, I must warn you I will be most critical of your actions as the mission leader.”

“There will be NO report!” Meng raised her voice angrily. “As far as we are concerned, this operation never existed. If word gets back to upper MSS brass that we handed the Soviets two million dollars for the names of seven women, then came up empty handed, it will be the end of all of us... and that includes you.”

“But...” Wen began, then suddenly stopped before continuing.

“But what?”

“You... you said ‘the names of seven... women.’” Wen looked shocked. “We only knew the names of three KGB agents on the list. They were women. But how... how do you know they were all female? And earlier, during the interrogation, Svetlana revealed that Nikolai worked out the deal with his Berlin MSS contact... in secret. That contact should have been me, but I only spoke to him once, and it was only about the logistical details. Was there more to this operation? Were you keeping information from me? From Anya?”

“Are you accusing me of something, Wen?” Meng’s voice grew louder as her anger rose. “If so, then out with it...”

“I... I don't know,” Wen stammered, and watched in alarm as the colonel stood up, drew her pistol and pointed it at her.

“Sung! Renshu!” Meng shouted. “Get in here!”

The two men had been standing outside the door of the colonel’s office. For security reasons, they had been instructed to do so whenever they were at the Yellow House with Meng. They had watched Wen follow Meng from the basement, and after witnessing the obvious friction between the two women, they were suspicious of Wen’s motives. They were not surprised when Meng called for them, and they quickly entered the room.

Meng had reached into the top drawer of her desk and pulled out a pair of handcuffs. She tossed them to Renshu, ordering him to cuff Wen, who stood frozen in shock and fear. Sung grabbed Wen’s arms and roughly forced them behind her back, bringing her wrists together so Renshu could apply the cuffs. Wen offered little physical resistance but was not shy about confronting her boss.

“What’s going on? Are you arresting me?” she objected strongly. “If you are, I demand to know the charges!”

“Insubordination, for one,” Meng replied, walking around the desk and keeping her gun trained on Wen. “I also suspect that it was you who was responsible for the failure of this operation... perhaps you were even colluding with Alex and Nikolai for a cut of the money! Like you said, you set up the logistics... and it was the logistics that failed us.”

“That’s nonsense!” Wen acted outraged, but she was more frightened than angry. To be accused of treachery would lead to some very serious consequences, especially when the charges came from her mission leader. “Sung and Renshu will support me... there is no evidence that I did anything wrong or treasonable.”

“You are mistaken. As you can see, Sung and Renshu are loyal to me. They know who provides for them. As for evidence, I'm sure a thorough investigation will reveal more than we need to prove your duplicity. For instance, perhaps even now you are wearing a wire in some feeble attempt to entrap me. Your questions were most insinuating, to say the least.”

“No! No! No! You are the one who is trying to set ME up!”

“We shall see.” Meng stood directly in front of Wen. “Hold her tight boys,” she warned Sung and Renshu, who grabbed their captive’s arms, arching her body forward. Meng grabbed the collars of Wen’s starched, white shirt, one in each hand, then yanked the fabric apart in opposite directions. Buttons clattered to the floor as Wen’s top was torn open, revealing a flimsy, demi-bra which barely covered her bulging breasts.

“Not the shy type, are you?” the colonel mocked her. With one hand, Meng grabbed the tiny scrap of cloth joining the bra cups, and easily ripped away the garment, letting it flutter to the floor. Unable to cover herself, Wen stood humiliated, her now fully exposed bosom pushed outward. The tight, black skirt of her uniform only served to accentuate her partial nudity.

“I guess I was wrong,” said Meng, feigning disappointment. “No wire in the obvious location.” She pushed her pistol against Wen’s right breast and traced the muzzle around her nipple, causing the tiny protrusion to swell noticeably. “As you can see, you cannot hide anything from us. In time, we will know the truth.”

Wen twisted against the two men’s grasp, but could not pull away from Meng, who continued to toy with her feminine charms. Fucking bitch, Wen thought to herself, but wisely refrained from saying anything.

“Sung, Renshu...” Meng called on the pair, stepping back from Wen. “Lock her up, strip her completely, and search her more thoroughly. There are many other places where she could be hiding her espionage tools.”

Both men grinned broadly, then turned to drag a disheveled and terrified Wen from the colonel’s office.

Chapter 18

When Alex returned to his apartment, it was almost noon. He had waited over an hour for Svetlana to show up for their rendezvous, but she had not arrived at the warehouse as planned. Something was wrong. Alex feared Svetlana had been tipped off about the operation, that she knew she had been targeted for extermination. Perhaps Nikolai had called her after discovering the bodies of the female KGB agents. He could easily have done so while he was waiting for Alex to arrive at the Barn. Alex began to panic. If Svetlana knew the truth, she would by now have exposed not only him but the entire plan... the real plan.

Alex poured himself a vodka and paced back and forth, wondering what to do next. He still had to return to the Barn to deal with Ragna, but if Svetlana already had contacted the KGB brass, the Barn was the first place they would look for him. His heart skipped a beat. They would find Ragna – still alive – and that would make matters even worse. He could explain the bodies, but the unsanctioned MSS con would be impossible to justify.

It was only after pondering these various possibilities that Alex noted the light on his answering machine was flashing. Was it Svetlana explaining why she wasn't able to make the meeting? Was it his superiors calling to see if he was home? He took a big gulp of his drink and pressed the play button, shaking nervously. There was one new message.

“Alex... I am calling to tell you that Anya, or rather Svetlana, if that is how you know her, will not be at your ten o'clock appointment.” The voice belonged to a man, and based on his accent, it was someone who normally spoke with a Canto dialect. Alex did not recognize who it was, but clearly the call was from MSS. Why would the agency be calling him about Svetlana... unless...

“Svetlana was apprehended by Chinese operatives during yesterday’s transaction,” the man continued. “As a KGB agent, she was dealt with – as the Americans say – with extreme prejudice. Before she died, she revealed no information which could jeopardize the operation. I have been asked to inform you that she will not pose any further threat to your work. You may carry out your remaining responsibilities without fear of reprisal from Svetlana.”

“They killed her!” Alex said to himself, while breathing a sigh of relief. “The buggers did the job for me... at least if this guy is telling the truth.”

Alex quaffed the rest of his vodka. He thought it was unlikely the Chinese would double cross him at this point. Only he had access to the dead KGB women, and only he could make the final arrangements. Most likely, the call was meant to reassure him, and perhaps to save him the time of waiting for Svetlana to show up. The message had arrived too late for that, but even if both Nikolai and Svetlana were not exactly dispatched as planned, it appeared both potential impediments had been eliminated.

Now only Ragna remained.

Ragna came to with a splitting headache, not to mention a plethora of pain which coursed through every nerve of her body. Her mind raced with a jumble of disturbing, dream-like thoughts which she soon realized were memories of all-too-real events: her capture by the Soviets; being gang raped and assaulted; her brutal torture at the hands of Alex; freeing herself and desperately making her way to... to where? For a moment Ragna could not remember what happened next, but then she recalled the second floor of the Barn... the cabinets containing the dead bodies, including the well-preserved corpse of Ivana Petrova. The lovely face of the ashen skinned agent was the last thing Ragna could recollect before her memories faded.

Ragna tried to move, but found herself restrained once again. She lay on her back, apparently on some sort of metal table, like the wheeled gurneys used in hospitals or – she shuddered – morgues. Her arms were wrenched above her head, pulled apart and tightly bound to the table. Her legs were also spread and fastened in the same way. Judging by her surroundings, she was still in the large room on the Barn’s upper floor. She turned her head to the left and saw the storage unit containing the cadavers. Again, she shuddered.

Feeling an unnatural weight pressing down on her chest, Ragna raised her head and looked directly into the cold, dead eyes of Nikolai. She gasped in horror. The man was lying across her upper body, shot to death. Blood from his torso streamed across her naked skin.

“Oh god... oh god... oh god...” Ragna repeated as she reacted to the ghastly sight. “Get the fuck off me, you bastard!” she wailed, while writhing about in a futile effort to buck the man’s corpse away from her. But her secure bondage and lack of energy made it impossible to budge the man’s heavy body. Nikolai remained cold and stiff, lewdly slumped over Ragna like an unwanted lover who had succumbed before even removing his clothes.

“Oh shit... this is so disgusting,” Ragna sobbed, tilting back her head so as not to look into Nikolai’s glassy death stare. She continued to squirm about on the table, but as her remaining strength ebbed, she gave up and accepted that she would remain confined as she was, at the mercy of whoever had incapacitated her until he returned.

Ragna did not have long to wait. Less than an hour after regaining consciousness, she heard someone open the door to the second floor chamber. Moments later, Alex was looking down at her with an evil sneer, wordlessly savoring the look of confusion and dread on his victim’s face.

“You...” said Ragna. “You caught me... here?”

“Stupid bitch,” Alex laughed. “Nikolai was right. You didn't even see who knocked you out. It was him.” Alex lifted the dead man’s head and forced Ragna to look at it, then dropped it back on her breast. “By now you must know how foolish you were to break free, but in doing so, you inadvertently doomed my former friend here as well.”

“You.... you killed Nikolai?”

“I'm afraid so. But even though it’s your fault, don't feel too badly. He did not have much longer to live anyway.”

“But why?” Ragna was lost. Nothing made sense to her anymore. “And the KGB agents on the list... all dead? And me... you let me live?”

“I suppose if I were in your shoes, I would find all this very confusing, too. Even more so because – as you by now must surely suspect Miss Ragna – your own superiors have not been honest with you. But don't worry. Being the considerate man that I am, I will enlighten you as much as I can before I kill you.”

Chapter 19

Among her co-workers in East Berlin, Wen was considered to be the most physically desirable female MSS operative in the city. Her sultry looks and surprisingly curvaceous figure continually turned heads wherever she went. Wen had been propositioned by so many love-struck officers that she had long ago lost count. She had turned them all down – maintaining a distant, professional demeanor that made it clear she had no intention of entertaining anything more than a casual coffee over which to discuss business. As for low ranking agents and enlisted personnel, Wen generally avoided them altogether. She acted cold and aloof, and didn't mind that most of her comrades considered her an unattainable ice queen.

What few knew was that Wen only had eyes for women, and even among them, she rarely indulged her sexual passions. She had slept with Ragna a few times, unable to resist one of the few local MSS females whose beauty approached her own, but for the most part, sex was a low priority for her... so much so, that when Colonel Meng had once suggested a late-night encounter, Wen had dismissively, and rather foolishly, turned down the senior officer. Relations between the two women had turned decidedly frosty ever since.

And now, with Wen accused of insubordination and treachery, these relations were nothing less than lethal.

As instructed, Renshu and Sung had taken Wen to a holding cell on the second floor of the Yellow House. There, they had torn off her remaining clothes and subjected her to a brutal strip search during which both men took liberties with her lush body -- liberties that they could only have dreamed of earlier. Technically, Wen was still their commanding officer, so it was terribly demeaning for her to be sexually abused by her own subordinates.

While Sung steadied the captive by pulling back on her cuffed arms, Renshu used his utility knife to shave away the silky strands of her neatly trimmed pussy. While pressing down on her clitoris with the blade, ostensibly to keep her still, he spread Wen’s vulva with his free hand and one by one, forced his fingers inside her. Soon Renshu had his entire hand buried in her sex. Wen cried out in pain, but feeling the cold steel against her tender clit, she suppressed the urge to struggle.

Renshu pushed his hand inside her as far as he could, then used his fingers to inspect the lining of her vaginal canal. Although he instantly confirmed that there was nothing to find, Renshu spent several minutes thrusting his hand back and forth, caressing Wen’s cervix and relishing the warm wetness of her inner maidenhood. When at last he was done, Renshu pulled out his glistening hand with a loud slurp, drawing a pitiful groan from Wen in the process.

“Nothing in there,” he said, to the surprise of no one.

“I guess that means I get the nasty job,” said Sung. “Bend over, bitch.”

“No!” Wen could not bear the thought of being violated again. “No... please! I'm not hiding anything, and you both know it. Just tell Meng you didn't find anything. Leave me a little dignity...”

“Maybe if you hadn't been so cold and harsh as our commander, we might be inclined to show some pity now,” Renshu said. “But given how you treated us, do you think we're going to pass up an opportunity to get some payback?”

“Besides, orders are orders, and the colonel expects us to be thorough,” added Sung. “Now once again, assume the position!”

“No... I won't! I can't!” Wen sobbed.

“Guess we'll have to do this the hard way,” said Renshu, making a fist and smashing it into Wen about four inches below her navel. Reflexively, she gasped and doubled over. Renshu grabbed the connecting chain of her handcuffs and yanked her arms toward him, forcing her into a strappado position. The more he pulled on the cuffs, the more Wen buckled forward. When at last her buttocks rose higher than the rest of her body, Renshu nodded to Sung.

“I think that should do it. You can start the probe.”

“No! Nooooo!! Aaaaiiiggh!!!” Wen screamed as Sung plunged his fist into her anus. Unlike Renshu, who had taken his time forcing his hand into her vagina, Sung used pure force to make as much headway as he could with a single thrust. By continuing to apply pressure, he soon had half his forearm embedded in Wen’s rectum, leaving her shrieking in agony.

“Oh come now, don't be such a wimp” Sung laughed. “Most women would pay to get a good fisting, especially a prim and proper ball-buster like you.”

“Noooo!! Please take it out!” Wen screamed. But this simply encouraged Sung to push deeper. Only when he feared causing permanent damage to the woman’s bowels, did he pull back slightly. He twisted his arm, cork-screwing it inside Wen’s ass, leaving her gasping in pain and on the verge of passing out. The “inspection” continued for five minutes, and as before, did nothing but verify what both men already knew – Wen was not concealing anything in her body.

When Sung at last removed his hand from her rectum, Renshu let go of her cuffs, and an exhausted Wen collapsed to the floor. Renshu kicked her onto her back and looked down to admire his comely victim as she lay panting and naked at his feet Sung walked to a nearby sink to clean the excrement from his arm.

“Do you think we need to search her anywhere else?” Renshu asked, imagining other ways they could torment their prisoner. “Maybe she’s hiding something in those big tits of hers. Maybe we should slice them open...”

“That won't be necessary,” a female voice replied. Colonel Meng had entered the cell to check on the two men. She kneeled down beside Wen and squeezed her breasts, one in each hand. “The only thing the bitch is hiding in these is silicone.”

Meng turned her attention to Wen’s vulva and inserted two fingers inside her, causing Wen to flinch and moan. Meng withdrew her fingers and noted the tips were covered with blood.

“I see you have completed the standard examination. I assume nothing was found?”

“No,” said Sung. “But I think we achieved the primary objective.”

“So I see.” Meng sniffed her fingers, then examined Wen’s mouth. “But you are not finished yet. I detect blood, but not semen...”

“But Colonel Meng...” said Renshu, sounding astonished. “We did not assume... I mean, you intended for us to... to pleasure ourselves as well?”

“I want you to fuck her to the brink of madness. If that gives you pleasure, so much the better.”

Sung and Renshu looked at each other in amazement. Both had used rape as an interrogation tactic to persuade resistant captives to cooperate, but never had they imagined ravaging one of their own, let alone a superior officer. Had the victim been anyone but Wen, they would have had second thoughts, but given their leader’s physical charms, not to mention how much they disliked her, Meng’s order was as welcome as it was unexpected.

“Noooo... no more... please, no more...” begged Wen as Sung grabbed her by the hair and pulled her to her knees. In seconds, Renshu had removed his trousers and underwear, revealing his already turgid member.

“I'll go first,” he said boldly.

Meng stayed to watch the beginning of the assault, then turned to leave.

“By the way,” she said as she walked out of the cell, “Wen is a dyke... so don't be afraid to teach her a few things that men can do. Just don't leave any marks.”

Chapter 20

“So the list of names was worthless?” Ragna was astonished to learn that the assignment for which she had risked her life was a sham. She was still on her back, strapped naked to the metal table with Nikolai’s body slumped on top of her. “Just seven dead agents of no use to MSS?”

“That’s right.” Alex took fiendish glee in revealing the futility of Ragna’s assignment. “It was simply a crime of opportunity, a way for me to fleece two million from your side while completing my primary mission. I needed Nikolai and a female colleague to carry out the plan, and as no one but your superiors knew of their involvement, killing my partners not only ensured the job would remain secret, but left me the sole benefactor of the payment.”

“But why torture and kill the seven agents – your own operatives?” Ragna asked. “If MSS never received the list, the KGB spies didn't pose a threat. They wouldn't have known anything about your scheme.”

“It was not my idea to kill them. I was simply following orders. My job is to gather intelligence... and that often involves interrogating those who can provide it. That is why I work at this place. Once I have what I want and I have no further need of my subjects, well... let’s just say they are expendable. Being such a subject yourself, I'm sure you know how the system works by now.”

Ragna shivered, suddenly reminded of her own fate. “So the operatives were double agents?”

“In a sense. Tell me Miss Ragna... do you know what a honey trap is?”

“Of course,” she said blushing, thinking about the many times she herself had filled the role. “It’s a female spy who seduces a usually male target to get him to reveal sensitive information.”

“Exactly. I should have known you would be intimately familiar with the term.” Alex placed his hand on Ragna’s pussy and massaged it gently. “Some women can use their feminine wiles to discover secrets that even the most brutal tortures could not pry from the enemy. The seven operatives were among the very best prostitutes in Moscow when the KGB recruited them, trained them, and stationed them in East Berlin at the Hotel Tempelhof. The hotel is within walking distance of Stasi headquarters and several foreign embassies. As highly desirable and experienced escorts, these women soon became among our most prolific sources of classified intelligence.”

Alex continued stroking Ragna’s sex, causing her to emit an involuntary moan. “Uung... so... so... they are all women,” she said, remembering the labels on the cabinets.

“Yes. Young... attractive... and now, unfortunately dead women. But while they were alive, they serviced high-level politicos and military brass from the East and the West. They were a gold mine of confidential information, including a wealth of material about MSS – even though there is supposedly no official Chinese presence in East Germany.”

Alex sighed, momentarily distracted by the memory. The enterprise had been his idea, and he had been rewarded with both a medal and a promotion in the service. “But we did not anticipate the greed of our so-called agents,” he said ruefully. “Being hookers, despite their espionage training, all they understood was sex and money. They fucked everyone, including Soviet nabobs. They had to... it would have looked suspicious if they had turned them down.”

“Let me guess,” Ragna said, anticipating the flaw in Alex’s operation. “The intel started flowing in both directions. You idiot... anyone could have... UUuuaagh!!” she cried out in pain as Alex quickly stopped fondling her and suddenly punched her in the groin.

“Bitch! You are in no position to judge me!” He hit her again, then brought his anger in check. “But you are right. Four hundred dollars an hour is more than enough to buy the allegiance of a whore whose loyalties to the state were questionable to begin with. Soon Soviet secrets were leaking from the Hotel Tempelhof just as readily as any others.”

“How... how did you find out?” Ragna feigned interest. She wanted to keep Alex talking because she feared what would happen when he stopped.

“Do you know who General Pavel Sochinsky is?” he asked her.

“The head of KGB operations in East Berlin. All MSS personnel in the city know of him.”

“Well it seems Sochinsky had grown quite fond of our contingent of ass-peddling spies... all seven in fact. The good general drinks so much vodka, he probably can't remember half of what he blabbed to the fucking sluts, but when the West Germans got hold of the specs for a new communications satellite we were building, Sochinsky got suspicious. He had mysteriously ‘lost’ his copy of the plans while staying at the Tempelhof, and though he managed to cover up his own stupidity, as far as the honey trap project was concerned, it was game over. That’s when I got the order.”

“From the general?”

“Directly. I was told to recall the seven operatives, bring them to this facility and squeeze each one until she revealed every foreign john to whom she'd sold Soviet intelligence and what it was. As the whole undertaking was my baby, I was put in charge of dismantling it and getting the girls to talk. The interrogations were brutal beyond belief, but we managed to get the bitches to tell us enough to satisfy Sochinsky. They're whores, not real operatives, so most of them cracked like bad eggs the minute they felt a twinge of pain. But too bad for them, it took a mountain of punishment for them to remember all their tricks.”

“And... and they died... tortured to death?” Ragna could not hide her terror.

“Most expired by the second day, but by then, they didn't have anything else to tell us. One lasted over a week, even though she didn't say a word for the last two days. But Sochinsky wanted them to suffer... and he demanded to see the proof.”

“Proof? You filmed the interrogations?” asked Ragna.

“No. For obvious reasons, nothing that happens here is recorded. Sochinsky wants the bodies. That’s why they're being kept on ice – so the bastard can see what we did to them and be perfectly sure that they are dead. I'm shipping them out to Karlshorst later today.”

Chapter 21

“Stop! Please stop!” Wen screamed. She was still at the mercy of Sung and Renshu in the second floor cell of the Yellow House. “I can't... I can't take it...”

Wen had been splayed over a two foot high wooden crate, her body arched across it so her genitalia were thrust as high as possible. Her legs had been spread wide with a broom handle, her ankles bound to each end of the shaft, which itself had been nailed to the floorboards. On the opposite side of the crate, a kneeling Sung held her now uncuffed wrists against the floor, wrenching her arms wide and keeping her torso immobile.

Crouching between Wen’s outspread thighs, Renshu hunched over the woman, thrusting back and forth with wild abandon. He had stripped off all his clothes, fully exposing his stout, muscular torso. Though Renshu was not much taller than his victim, his ripped and brawny frame presented a striking contrast to her lithe, softly curved body. As he repeatedly plunged his thick, stubby cock inside her, it seemed each thrust might literally tear her apart.

To Renshu, this hardly mattered. Lost in his own carnal reverie, he emitted bestial grunts and savored the gratification of his most primal urges. He looked down at Wen as her body rocked back and forth in concert with his savage humping, and he felt his passions rise further. Her head was tilted back over the edge of the crate, elongating her neck and enhancing her vulnerability.

For Renshu, Wen’s over-endowed breasts served as convenient handles which he could grab to steady himself as he ravaged her. With one fleshy protrusion in each hand, he alternately crushed Wen’s tits. Not only did she let out satisfying yelps of pain, but her body would buck and writhe in ways that added to the intensity of Renshu’s pleasure. At times, it took all of Sung’s strength to keep Wen’s hands pinned to the floor.

Though Wen had not fucked a man for many years, she had had enough experience with guys to know that Renshu’s erect penis was relatively short – five inches at best. It was the one small mercy of her ordeal, which otherwise was as horrifying a rape as any woman could imagine. As if to compensate for its lack of length, Renshu’s member was unusually broad and hard as granite, which combined to cause Wen even more anguish than if he were ramming her with a longer but thinner organ. Each thrust split her labia beyond their limits, ripping the tender tissue until Wen felt her warm blood trickle along her vulva. Her pain was relentless; her humiliation absolute; her fear unbounded.

Perhaps worst of all for Wen was that Renshu’s stamina seemed endless. For over a half hour he pummeled her sexually until she was no more than a limp, broken doll convulsing helplessly on the crate. Her back had been pierced by dozens of thick splinters from the rough, wooden slats, and her badly twisted spine seemed ready to snap from being cruelly bowed into such an abnormal position. “Come already, damn you!” Wen thought to herself, but she was too afraid to speak. Instead, she uttered an oddly orgasmic moan, which served only to buoy Renshu’s energy and further inflame his desire.

For another ten minutes, he continued to grind into Wen, by which time she was silently begging for death. But just as she thought she would succumb, Renshu exploded inside her, flooding her womb with a torrent of semen. He bellowed a cry of ecstasy and clamped his large hands around her abused breasts with such force that Wen was sure he would tear them off. Her scream of agony blended with Renshu’s climactic howl to create a bizarre, shrieking duet, which had Sung releasing Wen’s wrists and covering his ears.

And then, at last, it was done.

Renshu collapsed on the woman he had violated, having fulfilled a dream he never thought possible. He let his body slither on top of Wen’s sweat-slicked skin, delighting in the soft, smooth texture rubbing against his coarse, hairy chest. He pressed down on her with all his weight, forcing a tormented groan from her lips. Wen kept her head tilted back, refusing to look up at Renshu, even after he lifted himself off her and stood up. “At least it’s finished,” she thought to herself as she felt the loathsome sensation of the man’s gelatinous sperm leak from her torn vagina.

But when she finally did lift her head, she was appalled to see that Sung had also removed his clothes. Suffering as she did while Renshu defiled her, Wen had all but forgotten that she was the prisoner of two men – and that both had been ordered to violate her. Her heart sank as she realized her nightmare was a long way from over.

Unlike Renshu, Sung chose to ravage Wen in a less barbaric manner. Mindful of Colonel Meng’s warning not to leave any marks, he set about his task with a little more finesse than his callous comrade... assuming one can commit a rape of any kind with “finesse”. Unwilling to insert his penis in the orifice which now was awash with Renshu’s sticky fluids, Sung instead chose to take advantage of Wen’s sumptuous mouth.

Not knowing what to expect from her second assailant, Wen could only look on in horror when once again he kneeled down next to her head. The two men kept their captive arched over the wooden crate, though this time Sung used the handcuffs to restrain her arms. Pulling them over her head, he cuffed her wrists together, then nailed the connecting chain to the floorboards as they had done with the broom handle securing her legs. This time, there would be no need to hold the woman’s hands down.

“I beg you...” Wen pleaded. “I'll do whatever you want... but no more of this... no more...” Renshu laughed and ran his fingers along the cum-soaked cleavage between her labia. He coated the tips with semen and smeared the coagulating substance across Wen’s lips, leaving her gagging.

“That’s a little lubrication to help you get started,” he said to Sung, his laugh growing louder.

“You idiot.” Sung was not amused. “I'm fucking her mouth so I don't have to get your used gism on me, and now you're sliming it on her lips. You really are a pig.” Sung did his best to wipe away the offending goo and prepared to take his turn. As Wen stared in disbelief, Sung’s average sized cock swelled enormously when it grew erect. It easily matched the girth of Renshu’s organ, but to her dismay, it was over twice as long. She had never seen anything so big.

“No... Noooo!!” she cried out. “You'll kill me with that thing! I'll choke to death!!”

“Do I look like I care?” Sung said, showing no sign of pity for his victim. He grabbed Wen’s hair and pulled back her head, again stretching her neck over the edge of the crate so that she had an upside-down view of his enormous genitals. “And no funny business with the teeth,” Sung warned, “or I'll cut your fucking head off.”

“Oh god... of god... Ogloorrpp.” Wen let out a wet, slurping sound as Sung forced the full length of his manhood down her throat. Instantly, he felt the warm, pleasurable sensation of having his penis sheathed in the woman’s gullet. He moaned and slid his cock back and forth as Wen squirmed desperately, struggling for breath.

Sung’s endurance rivaled that of Renshu’s, and it was almost an hour before he finally achieved orgasm. This time, the deluge of seminal fluids streamed down her esophagus and into her digestive tract, though when he finally pulled his softening member from between Wen’s lips, an appreciable quantity of sperm gushed from her mouth as well.

Despite Wen’s fears, Sung’s oral invasion did not asphyxiate her, but it did leave her gasping and weakened to the point of delirium. She breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that with both men spent, her sexual violation had finally drawn to a close.

She could not have been more wrong.

By the time Sung climaxed, Renshu had recovered sufficiently to begin another round, and with Wen’s ass untapped, he could not resist taking advantage of this relatively pristine orifice.

After another half hour passed, Sung joined in as well, and soon both men were assaulting the captive MSS agent at once. It took almost four hours of continuous sexual attacks before Wen’s ordeal ended at last. Though both Sung and Renshu had the fortitude to extend their victim’s suffering further still, it was Wen who had finally succumbed to their relentless onslaught.

With the two men riding on top of her arched torso – Renshu straddling her pelvis and Sung astride her pneumatic chest – the fragile crate supporting her collapsed, sending a decimated Wen crashing to the floor with the weight of her two tormentors landing on top of her. She gasped and passed out instantly, surrounded by the shattered wooden slats, her nude body anchored to the floor by the handcuffs and broom handle.

Renshu stood up and kicked the unconscious woman several times. Wen did not respond.

“I guess there’s not much we can do with her now,” he said sadly.

“Playtime’s over,” added Sung.

Soon after, Colonel Meng returned to the cell, once again to check on the pair’s progress. Both men were naked but unashamed of their commander’s presence. Meng knew their bodies well, and had frequently enjoyed their sexual prowess in the past. She looked down at Wen and for a moment, she seemed concerned.

“Please tell me you didn't kill her,” she said.

“No... she’s still alive,” Sung reassured her.

Meng leaned forward to examine Wen more closely. Her body glistened with sweat and sperm, but there were only a few bruises and traces of blood. Most importantly, her ample bosom rose and fell rhythmically as she breathed.

“I trust you made the bitch suffer?” Meng asked.

“As much as we dared.” Renshu said proudly. Meng knew that meant her orders had been carried out.

“Excellent. I find it most amusing – and ironic – that this lesbian cunt’s final fuck was administered by a pair of vicious males. But her primary destiny has yet to come. I had not anticipated that we would be dealt a scapegoat to conceal our plans, but now that we have one, we can be grateful for our good fortune. A pity that it will lead to even greater adversity for Wen... though to be honest, the thought of what is in store for her makes me quiver with delight.”

“But what do we do with her now?” asked Sung.

“She will remain here. Make sure she is restrained and imprisoned until we need her. In the meantime, I would like both of you to accompany me downstairs. I have some, er... confidential matters to attend to.” Meng grinned and left the cell.

Sung and Renshu smiled at each other. They knew what Meng had in mind. It took them only a few minutes to tie up Wen more securely, and without bothering to get dressed, they joined the colonel in her office.

Chapter 22

Alex grabbed Nikolai’s body by the shoulders and pulled it off Ragna, dragging it to a corner of the room and dropping it to the floor. Though she was grateful to at last be rid of the man’s corpse, Ragna suddenly felt oddly exposed without the cadaver covering her upper torso. She knew it was an absurd thought, especially since Alex had only seen her naked, but when he returned to the table she was unexpectedly ashamed of being deprived of even the slightest covering.

Perhaps it was how she was restrained, spread out and vulnerable, or perhaps it was how Alex leered at her body while idly fondling it at regular intervals, or perhaps it was the realization that she might never again enjoy the luxury of clothing, Whatever the reason, Ragna became more conscious of her nudity and wondered why it was always the female spies who were denied apparel when captured. Whether or not this was true, she could easily guess why it was so.

“Thank-you,” she said to Alex after he had removed Nikolai, regretting seconds later that she showed any sign of gratitude to her sadistic tormentor.

“Don't bother thanking me. I just prefer the view without the bastard on top of you,” laughed Alex. “Too bad you're such a mess – that whip really fucked up your tits – otherwise I'd have a go at you. But to be honest, you're really not worth my time.”

Alex confirmed Ragna’s suspicions that men preferred their female victims to be no more than titillating slabs of meat. Perceiving their comely captives as soulless mannequins, whose only purpose was sex, made it easier to mistreat them... to torture them... to kill them.

“Then why...” Ragna began, almost afraid to ask what had been on her mind since she regained consciousness, “...why am I still alive?” She knew she was going to die. Alex had already told her as much. But why had he not killed her yet? Why was he prolonging her agony?

“A very good question.” Alex seemed eager to answer her. “I have a confession to make,” he continued, leaning in close to her ear and adding in a mock whisper, “You promise you won't tell anyone?” He grinned. Ragna knew he was toying with her and did not respond.

“I've only killed six of the seven honey traps. One of the whores, an agent named Valentina Toporkoa was tipped off and escaped capture. I have not been able to find her, so one of the morgue cabinets remains empty. But it won't be for long. It will be your job to take her place. Like the other six bitches, you have been conveniently tortured and you can proudly display the evidence of your ordeal. Your body is clearly that of an operative whose job it would be to seduce male targets. And no one will miss you, as even your own comrades in MSS must think you are dead by now.”

“You're a fool.” Raga could not believe what she was hearing. “I'm Asian... a Chinese agent... do you think anyone would ever believe I was a Soviet operative? Besides, if Sochinsky slept with all these women, he'll certainly know in an instant he’s never been with me. How can you be so... Aaaaiiggh!!” Ragna cried out as Alex once again began beating her.

“You are the fool, you stupid bitch!” he yelled. “By now you should know the consequences of disparaging me!”

“No,.. no... I only meant... I...” Ragna sputtered, realizing too late the folly of aggravating the man.

“Do you think I don't know this? Obviously, I have found a way to deal with the problem.”

“Then just kill me... and do whatever you want!” Ragna was terrified about what was in store for her. She could no longer bear being taunted by Alex, who clearly thrived on her panic and dread. She wanted her nightmare to end, and if that meant she had to die now, she was prepared to make the sacrifice.

“In time,” he replied. Ragna whimpered, crushed that Alex would not grant her request. Her suffering would continue.

“But why? Why draw out my torment?”

“Aside from taking the place of Valentina Toporkoa, you will serve one additional function. Like the bodies of the other six women, yours will be modified to fulfill my ultimate objective... the destruction of the Karlshorst building.”

“But... but Karlshorst is the primary center of operations for the KGB in East Berlin. The Stasi have provided it to Russia... to your side... so the Soviets are able to maintain jurisdiction. It has been an MSS target for years... but Karlshorst is virtually impenetrable. I... I don't understand...”

“Nor do I expect you to, Miss Ragna. Perhaps it will be some small comfort to you that after those failed attempts by the Chinese to wrest control of the East from the KGB, you – a lowly MSS lackey – will play a significant role in accomplishing that very goal. Sadly, you will not live to see the successful completion of your final mission.”

“But... how?” Ragna was in a daze. What Alex described made no sense at all to her.

“With this,” he said, holding up an object, the sight of which made her flinch. It was a metal cylinder, half a yard long and six inches in diameter. It tapered to a rounded tip at one end and was flat at the other.

“This is an artillery shell,” Alex explained. “Originally, it was meant to be fired from a 155mm Howitzer, but I have modified it so it can be exploded from over a mile away with a remote detonator. The shell is packed with three kilos of Semtex H, probably sufficient to do serious damage to the Karlshorst building, but not enough to bring it down completely. I would guess three or four should do the job, but not being one to take chances, I will deploy seven. Can you guess where the other six have been planted?”

“Nooo!! Oh god no!!” Ragna screamed. Instantly, she realized the shells were in the corpses of the dead agents, and that the one Alex was holding would soon be inside her. Given its phallic shape, she also knew how the explosive device would be inserted into her body. Desperately, she pulled at her restraints in a futile attempt to break free, all the while howling in protest.

Confirming Ragna’s fears, Alex positioned the shell lengthwise between her spread thighs and moved it up until she could feel the cold metal tip push against her sex.

“At first, I thought I'd have to resort to some improvised surgery to get these things into the bodies,” he said, “but since all the agents are female, I realized they already had natural, god-given repositories which were well suited for my needs. Of course, it’s a bit of a tight fit, but if women can squeeze a baby through that narrow opening, they can sure as shit take a 155 shell in the opposite direction.”

“Please... please have mercy! Kill me first!” Ragna sobbed.

“I suppose that would make matters somewhat less unpleasant for you. But after struggling to get these shells into those expired girls, I think it’s a lot less work for me to drive one into a bitch who’s still alive. You see, after you're dead, your muscles contract and clench up, making it a lot harder for me to ram this thing up your snatch. So, since you're still loose and limber, I think I'll take advantage of that.”

“Nooo!! Don't... Please... Aaaiiiieeeghhh!!” Ragna wailed as Alex shoved the shell inside her. At first, he had to swivel it about to cleave the woman’s vaginal lips far enough apart to accept its girth, but once its full circumference had entered her, it was only a matter of applying enough force to sink its entire length into her body.

“I'm afraid you may not survive being impaled by a lover a foot and a half long, but at least you get to experience being fucked in a way other women can only dream of.” As Ragna screeched in anguish, Alex continued to push the enormous metal projectile deeper into her sex, ripping through her cervix and eventually forcing the oversized invader into her abdomen. Although the shell’s insertion caused irreparable damage to Ragna’s internal anatomy, it did not prove fatal, even after it had been thrust completely inside her.

Once the object was completely buried in Ragna’s body, Alex pressed a button on its base, releasing two small blades which knifed into the woman’s flesh and lodged the device in place.

Ragna’s screams grew louder than ever, indicating that, remarkably, she remained alive. Writhing in agony, her sweat-slicked body thrashed on the metal table. She felt the monstrous thing inside her but could do nothing to push it out. It had become a part of her.

Like the six Soviet honey traps, she now was no more than a delivery mechanism for three kilos of plastic explosives that would take down the city’s KGB headquarters. Although at this point, she should not have cared about Alex or his intentions, she could not help but wonder why... why a KGB operative was using her and six Russian operatives to destabilize Soviet jurisdiction in East Berlin.

Ragna was dying. Slowly. The rapacious shell had shredded her reproductive system as well as her intestines. It had lacerated her kidneys and liver. So deep had it penetrated that the tip had perforated her diaphragm. With her organs sustaining so much damage, Ragna was bleeding internally so severely that even had she received immediate medical attention, there was nothing that could have been done to save her.

But Ragna’s heart continued to beat. And her mind was fully conscious, leaving her aware of all that was happening to her. She was consumed with pain beyond any she could ever have imagined, but having spent the last of her energy struggling against her bonds, she could only lie spent and exhausted on the table, enduring her torment and feeling her life gradually ebb away.

In a barely audible, raspy voice, Ragna again begged Alex to kill her, to end her suffering once and for all. But he ignored her pleas. Instead he left her alone for several minutes before returning with a piece of cloth and some string.

“Don't worry, beautiful... it will be over soon,” he said in a reassuring tone, tracing his fingers over her ruined body. Although these were the words that Ragna wanted to hear, she suspected Alex would not grant her an easy exit. Whatever he had planned for her, he was taking his time, caressing her breasts, then gliding his hand down her midsection until he reached her lightly tufted pussy. He massaged her mons, as well as her mangled labia and clitoris, which now were no more than tattered hunks of flesh. Blood cascaded from her vaginal opening, which had closed around the metal intruder, but was unable to stem the flow of fluids which were flooding the inside of Ragna’s body.

“I'm afraid that your cunt is a goner,” Alex laughed, raising his hand so Ragna could see his blood-soaked fingers. “But I suppose men could always use one of your other orifices. Sadly, I'm afraid one of those will have to be sacrificed as well.”

Ragna shook her head and moaned as Alex lifted the cloth, which in fact was a thick burlap hood intended for the many visitors to the Barn who were executed by firing squad. Now it was destined for Ragna, who was too weak to offer any resistance as Alex pulled it over her head. Instantly, she was overwhelmed by a pungent smell which made her retch and become light headed. The burlap was wet after having been soaked in some sort of liquid. Instinctively, Ragna closed her eyes and mouth, but she could not escape the powerful scent, which was both unpleasant yet oddly familiar.

“Naptha,” Alex said, anticipating that Ragna might not be able to identify the odor. “I've saturated the hood with petroleum based lighter fluid so that I can deal with the problem which you too were astute enough to recognize...”

“No... nooo... aackkk...” Ragna could let out only throaty, muted gasps as Alex tightened the string around her neck to seal the hood in place. She no longer had the stamina to protest, or even shake her head, but her heart pounded with terror as she realized what Alex planned to do.

“You were quite right that an Asian woman would make a poor substitute for a Russian agent, and as it is quite possible that all seven bodies will be inspected before being admitted to the very secure Karlshorst facility, I will simply have to erase all evidence of your racial heritage. After I incinerate that lovely head of yours, you will easily pass for a European whore – especially if no one has cause to suspect otherwise. Of course, there is a slight chance that Sochinsky might notice that your body is one he has not encountered before, but given the state you're in and the number of sluts he’s fucked, I doubt that will happen. Besides, by the time he sees you, it will be too late.”

Ragna moaned, and with all her remaining strength, she uttered what would become her final words.

“Please... don't...”

Alex did not reply. He reached into his pocket and withdrew a lighter, flicked the spark wheel and ignited a flame. Relishing Ragna’s abject horror as she awaited her impending doom, he let the flame hover just two inches above her face. She could see the bright light flicker through the burlap and silently cursed her captor for extending her agony for his own amusement.

Alex waited for over a minute, waving the lighter back and forth as Ragna silently went insane with fear. And then, when even he finally lost interest in terrorizing her, Alex lowered the flame and ignited the hood. Instantly, the burlap caught fire and blazed so intensely that Alex had to step back to keep from being burned himself.

Ragna let out an ear-splitting, blood-curdling shriek which continued unabated for over a minute as the conflagration burned away the burlap, melting her once exquisite features, setting fire to her hair, and ultimately turning her head into a grotesque lump of charred flesh and bone, barely recognizable as human, let alone a once stunning Asian woman.

After nearly five minutes, the flames finally died down. Smoke rose from what was left of Ragna’s partially skeletonized head. The roasted tissue that remained was pulled taught, stretching open her mouth in a ghastly death scream.

Alex approached Ragna’s body and gingerly touched her forehead. Instantly, he pulled his hand away.

“That’s a hot bitch,” he said with a laugh, then prepared to move the corpse into the last vacant drawer of the morgue cabinet.

Chapter 23

Colonel Meng sat at her desk in the yellow building office. She was barely dressed in a sheer lace bra, matching panties and four inch heels, all of which she had put on again after her naked romp with Sung and Renshu. The two men had walked out moments earlier, leaving Meng alone and more than a little frustrated.

She couldn't really blame them. After all, they previously had spent four hours ravishing Wen, so it wasn't really fair for Meng to expect them to perform at their best immediately afterwards. She should have allowed them enough time to recover, but on this day, that was not possible.

It was ten minutes after five o'clock, and Meng was expecting an important call at six. If everything was going according to plan, Renshu and Sung would have work to do a short while later. Meng had matters to attend to as well, though on realizing she had fifty minutes to spare, perhaps she still could relieve her sexual tensions by combining some pleasure with business.

She walked to the office bar and selected a bottle of Shiraz from the available wines, then opened it and filled two glasses. Meng took a vial from a cabinet under the bar and twisted off the cap. The vial contained a small amount of white powder, which she shook into one of the glasses, swirling the wine until the substance was fully dissolved. She placed the glass on the coffee table, then took the other one and sat on a couch to enjoy a few sips. After a few minutes had passed there was a knock on the door.

“Enter,” Meng said. Sung stepped into the room, pushing a completely nude Wen ahead of him.

“Here she is,” he said. “As requested.” Sung looked a bit sheepish, still embarrassed because of his lackluster efforts to satisfy his commanding officer. Meng smiled.

“That is fine. Thank-you. You can go now.”

Sung left and closed the door behind him, leaving Wen standing awkwardly in the middle of the room. As per Meng’s instructions, Sung had removed Wen’s handcuffs, leaving her completely unfettered. With the two men waiting outside, Meng saw no need to restrain her prisoner. In fact, given her plans to take advantage of what Wen had to offer, it was important that the woman’s hands were free.

Wen looked up. It did not take her long to guess Meng’s intentions. When you are called to the boss’s office and she is wearing only sexy underwear and stilettos, you pretty well know what to expect.

“So you intend to rape me as well?” Wen said disdainfully. “You're going to have to work pretty hard to top what those two animals did to me.” She nodded to the door, knowing both men were standing guard outside.

“Relax. I'm not interested in torturing you.” Meng’s voice was soft and inviting. She patted the cushion next to where she was sitting. “Instead, I was hoping you could be the one to take advantage of me.”

“Is that an order?”

“Yes,” Meng replied sternly. “Now sit down and have some wine.” She pointed at the glass on the coffee table.

“I guess you're not concerned about getting blood on the furniture.” Wen was bitter about her mistreatment and she was not going to let her superior’s sudden good-cop routine lessen her animosity.

“Don't worry. I'll lick your wounds first.”

Wen sighed and sat beside Meng. She did not resist as Meng leaned forward and sucked on her nipple. She knew it was best to cooperate. After all, enduring Meng’s seduction was far less unpleasant than being violated by Sung and Renshu. Wen pretended she was with Ragna, that she was willingly giving herself to anyone but this duplicitous bitch. Closing her eyes, Wen let her body respond to Meng’s caresses.

“Mmmm...” sighed Meng, moving back her head and noticing that Wen’s nipples had suddenly become conspicuously erect. “It seems you aren't quite as upset with me as I thought.”

Wen did not reply. She knew what was expected of her. Sliding her body against Meng’s she reached around her, unclasped her bra, and slid it off her shoulders to reveal a pair of pert, enticing breasts. Both women embraced and Wen crushed her much larger bosom against Meng’s, drawing a long, throaty moan from the colonel. They kissed and stayed entwined for several minutes before Meng gently pulled away.

“Not so fast darling,” she said. “You haven't even touched your wine.”

Wen was not all that interested in drinking, but obediently picked up the glass and quickly downed half the contents. Returning her attentions to Meng, she pushed her back until the woman was lying on the couch, then removed her panties. Wen positioned herself between Meng’s spread legs. Closing her eyes and, once again thinking of Ragna, Wen moved her mouth to Meng’s shaved and very moist pussy.

“Oohhh!! God!! Yessss!! Fuck!!” Meng bleated noisily as she reached her third orgasm in less than a half hour. Wen had dutifully administered to the colonel’s carnal desires in ways Meng had not experienced in quite some time. Sung and Renshu, like most men, simply didn't understand a woman’s needs, but Wen, being female herself, not to mention one who preferred the company of her own sex, knew exactly what buttons to push to completely satisfy the colonel.

Meng would happily have continued playing with Wen for several hours, but she knew their time together would be decidedly limited. In fact, even before Meng had fully recovered from her last climax, Wen sat up on the couch, her skin pale and her pupils dilated.

“What’s wrong?” asked Meng, feigning concern.

“I... I don't know... All of a sudden I feel... woozy...” Wen stood up and put both hands to her head. She began to shiver and her legs wobbled unsteadily. She was able to keep her balance for only a short while before her eyes rolled back and she fell forward, her body collapsing onto the coffee table. Landing on the half-empty wine glass, Wen smashed it beneath her, letting out a brief yelp before losing consciousness.

“Christ, what a klutz...” Meng muttered, then stood up and rolled Wen onto her back, leaving her body arched onto the table. She pulled a shard of broken glass from Wen’s left breast, then shook her head in annoyance as she inspected the nasty gash it left just below the nipple. Blood pumped vigorously from the puncture, combining with the wine which stained Wen’s midsection.

“Fuck. This bitch can't do anything right.” Meng said to herself, then shouted toward the door, “Sung! Renshu! Get in here!”

Both men entered immediately. Neither seemed at all surprised to see Wen lying unconscious, but like Meng, they were alarmed by the woman’s wound.

“Shit... what happened?” asked Renshu. “She’s bleeding like a stuck pig.”

“Don't ask,” Meng said in frustration. “Just get a med kit and patch up the slut so she doesn't drain completely before we get her out of here. I'm expecting the call in five minutes. If everything went well, you two can hit the road after I've made arrangements for where to take the body.”

Renshu nodded and left to get the med kit. Sung grabbed some bar cloths and pressed them against Wen’s perforated breast to stem the blood flow. Meng gathered up her clothing and got dressed.

Chapter 24

The two men, both privates in the KGB facility’s clean-up crew, pulled the seventh body from the last of the cabinets. One at a time, they already had removed the previous six, zipped them into body bags and placed them on a stretcher before carting them downstairs to be loaded into a delivery van parked outside the Barn. Immediately, the men noticed the last body was different.

“Jesus...” one of them exclaimed, “this one’s still kinda warm... and her head... look at her head... it’s been burned to a crisp.” Both turned away to keep from becoming nauseous.

“Never mind,” said Alex, who was overseeing their work. “Just get her bagged and into the truck with the others.”

“She might not be much from the neck up,” said the second private as he helped his co-worker zip Ragna’s corpse into a plastic sack, “but shit, what a body. I think she was probably the most fuckable of the bunch. What a waste.”

“Yeah.” The first private nodded in agreement, then turned to Alex. “If you don't mind me asking, what did these babes do to deserve all this abuse. I've been baggin’ ‘em up around here for months, but I've never seen anything like this...”

“Just do the job,” Alex said sternly. “And remember, this is on the QT. Tell anyone, and you'll be in a bag of your own before you know it.”

“Okay, okay... I was just curious.”

Alex reminded the two men of the route to take to Karlshorst, and to pull up the van to a delivery entrance at the rear of the building.

“There will be some people there to meet you. They may want to identify the bodies before taking them inside, but as you must know by now, this sort of thing is pretty routine, as most KGB casualties are taken to the Karlshorst pathology lab to be autopsied. Once the corpses are cleared, your orders are to help take them inside, then call me from the building cafeteria when you are ready to leave.”

“Right, right...” said the first private impatiently. “Trust me... we've done this often enough before.” Together, the two men lifted the stretcher and carried Ragna’s body out of the room.

Alex waited until he heard the truck drive away, then looked at his watch. It was two minutes to six o'clock. His timing had been impeccable.

Alex picked up the phone and called his new boss. It only took one ring for Meng to answer.

“The delivery men are on their way,” Alex informed her. “Everything has gone well, though not exactly according to plan.”

“True,” replied Meng. “But in many ways, the operation has turned out better than we had anticipated. You have managed to draft a seventh dead ‘agent’, even without locating Valentina Toporkoa in time. And soon you shall have an MSS official to take the fall for what is about to happen.”

“You found a stooge... in your own organization?” Alex had not expected anyone would be identified as a suspect, but if Meng had found someone to draw attention away from the possibility of a KGB traitor, that certainly would be beneficial. Of course, the KGB would most likely presume a foreign interest was behind the deed, but with an MSS operative already established as the culprit, there would be virtually no reason to speculate it was an internal double-cross.

“Yes. A female captain who reports... reported to me. She has been somewhat disruptive lately, and I would have had to deal with her one way or another. I have no qualms about handing her over to you.”

“Alive?” Alex sounded concerned.

“Of course. I'm sure you have the, erm... resources to deal with her.”

“But if she reported to you, won't she give away the whole operation?”

“She knows nothing of our arrangement. The two million dollar exchange for the list of names was not only profitable for you, it proved to be an excellent smoke screen for me. She will likely reveal the transaction, and when she finds out what she is accused of, she will attempt to pin it on me... but as we know, I have the perfect cover.”

“What about me?” asked Alex. “She knows I was involved in the original operation, so she will most likely try to implicate me as well.”

“With no support for her story, and without the list of names, who would believe her? It’s a preposterous tale to begin with, and your people will treat it as a desperate attempt to deflect the much more serious allegations she faces. She will know you because you will be the one turning her in, and so it will be expected that she will try to implicate you. But I'm sure you can lay a trail of bread crumbs connecting her to our primary objective.”

“Very well. I understand. Where can I pick up this Captain...”

“Wen. The less I tell you about her, the better. I know you are on a tight schedule, so you tell me where it would be convenient for us to leave the pigeon. She has been rendered unconscious and will remain so for another four hours at least.”

Alex thought for a moment. Allowing for a fifteen minute head start by the van transporting the bodies, and a minimum half hour for the inspection and unloading, he would be able to drive within detonation range with another fifteen minutes to spare.

“There’s a sewage culvert that runs under Alfelder Strasse at Langer Weg. It’s two miles from where I will set off the devices. I can be there by 7:45.”

“That works well,” said Meng. “My men can be there in twenty minutes and drop off the cargo. It will be waiting for you when you arrive.”

“Fine. I'm on my way then.” Alex was about to hang up when he remembered to ask Meng one more thing. “By the way, Colonel, I got a phone message this morning. I think it was one of your guys telling me he'd dispatched Svetlana...”

“That’s right. Except I handled it personally. Wen brought your so-called Anya in for interrogation, and even though it seemed she had nothing to offer, I didn't want to risk her unintentionally revealing something that might make Wen suspicious. You can thank me later for saving you the trouble.”

“I take it her final hours were not pleasant?”

“No. In fact, when I blew her away, you could say I did her a favor as well.”

Alex smiled and hung up the phone. Svetlana had died suffering. He'd gotten his wish after all.

Forty minutes later, Alex turned his Mercedes off Köpenicker Strasse onto Alfelder, then pulled over to the side of the road just before reaching Langer Weg. As he had hoped, the street was deserted. He exited the car and opened the trunk, reached inside, and pulled out the now cold, stiff body of Nikolai. He kicked it over a small embankment running alongside the road, then shuffled down the incline until he stood next to the cadaver.

In front of him, running under the street, was the sewage culvert he had mentioned to Meng. Just inside it, covered in filth, was the unconscious, naked body of Wen, left by Sung and Renshu as the colonel had promised. Trying not to muddy his clothes, Alex grabbed Wen’s wrists and pulled her out of the metal tunnel. In her place, he left Nikolai’s corpse.

Alex dragged Wen up the embankment and quickly lifted her into the Mercedes’ trunk, then slammed it shut. He turned the car around and picked up his initial route at Köpenicker. Five minutes later, he was at a bank of phone booths outside a discount grocery store less than a mile from the Karlshorst building. He entered the second booth and waited.

It was almost a half hour before the phone rang. It had taken longer than Alex expected for the bodies to be taken inside. It was probably that bitch Ragna’s roasted head that had held things up, he thought. Alex picked up the receiver.

“They're all in. Mission accomplished.” It was one of the two clean-up crew privates.

“Where did they take them?”

“To the pathology lab in the basement, as always. They're laid out side by side. General Sochinsky has been paged and likely is on his way to inspect them now.”

“Very good.” It had all worked out exactly as planned. “And you and your comrade... you are both in the building as instructed?”

“Yes sir. I assume we may go now?”

“Yes. It is time for you to leave.” Alex hung up the receiver and retrieved a transmitter about the size of a cigarette pack from his pocket. He pulled a small antenna from the device, then pressed a single green button on its side. A second later, he felt the phone booth shake slightly, and in the distance he heard the satisfying sound of a powerful explosion.

Chapter 25

“I had no idea the Chinese were the ones we needed to worry about most.” The large, rotund man puffed on his cigar, shaking his head in amazement. A cloud of smoke enveloped his ruddy face and obscured his furrowed brow. It was rare to see an officer as high-ranking as General Guryev at a KGB intelligence outpost, let alone in the Barn itself, but to see both Guryev and Colonel Lytkin, not to mention a half dozen of their subordinates together in one of the interrogation cells attested to the severity of what had occurred. It was already being referred to as the Karlshorst Incident less than two hours after it happened.

“None of us suspected the Chinese,” said Alex. “That’s why I was surprised to receive a tip from one of the few moles we have in the MSS organization in East Berlin. The call came less than half an hour before the strike, so I had very little time to act. Unfortunately, when I arrived at my destination, it was too late.”

“But you did manage to capture one of the operatives who carried out the attack,” said the colonel, pointing at the naked woman on the floor. Wen lay on her back, still unconscious, and with her hands tightly bound behind her. She was bruised and disheveled, her body splattered with sludge. “Tell me how you managed to do this.”

“There was not enough time for me to reach the target building and evacuate it, so instead I tried to intercept whoever was detonating the explosives at the remote location provided by our informant. I heard the blast just as I arrived, then I saw an Asian woman running to a car and driving away. I chased her for several miles, and eventually I was able to force her vehicle to a stop at the side of the road. At that point, she escaped on foot by scrambling down an embankment and dashing along a gulley. Of course, I continued my pursuit as well, running after her until I caught her trying to elude me by hiding in a sewage culvert.”

“I see,” said Lytkin. “That would explain her squalid state, but how did this poor girl manage to lose her clothes?”

“Unfortunately, she did not give in as I expected,” Alex continued. “She charged at me and we soon were fighting hand to hand. Eventually, I proved victorious by slamming her head against the culvert’s retaining wall and knocking her out. By this time, we were both covered in filth. To minimize the mess, I stripped her and disposed of her shredded garments. Besides, I knew she would not be needing them again.”

“And you, I see, have had the opportunity to shower and change into your uniform,” Guryev laughed.

“Yes... but this affair has cost me a very good suit.”

“Tell me, Lieutenant,” Lytkin had another question, “were neither of you armed?”

“I was, but I did not want to risk killing the woman before we could question her. Luckily for me, she left her gun in her briefcase, which I later recovered from her car – along with these.” Alex handed the colonel a pile of documents. “You'll find all the evidence we need here. Plans for the attack, a detailed layout of the Karlshorst building, even an invoice for 25 kilos of Semtex H.... and most damning of all, I found this...” Alex held up the detonator.

“It seems you nabbed the right suspect,” said the general, his eyes drinking in the sight of Wen’s curvaceous form. “Why is it always the most beautiful ones who create so much mischief?”

“Well, I'm sure she did not act alone,” said Colonel Lytkin. “The assault was well planned and executed. It would have required the support of others as well as leadership. This bitch may have pulled the trigger... but she had help.”

“Which is why I have brought her here,” explained Alex. “This is where we get to the truth, where we persuade both enemies and traitors to reveal all they know. If you agree, gentlemen, we can begin the interrogation at any time.”

“There were no names mentioned in the documents?” asked Guryev. “Are you certain you searched her automobile thoroughly? Perhaps we should send some men to see if there is more evidence in the car.”

“No,” Alex replied nervously, knowing of course there was no car to search. “I'm certain there is nothing else to retrieve. Besides, with the keys in the ignition, I'm quite sure her vehicle will have been stolen by now.”

“You're probably right.” Guryev shook his head slowly, still admiring the lovely prisoner at their feet. “I do so abhor torture, but I suppose we have no other choice. You may begin.”

Alex smiled. “Dmitri,” he called out the name, and a muscular, bare-chested man emerged from the shadows. “It is time.”

Chapter 26

Alex had taken Wen to Room 1, the largest of the four interrogation cells at the Barn, and the only one with an observation booth. This proved fortuitous, as initially he had not expected that two senior KGB officers and their entourage would be attending Wen’s inquiry. He did not want Guryev, Lytkin and the others to be close enough to the woman to directly ask her questions of their own, so he politely informed them it would be best to watch the proceedings from behind the glass partition of the booth. All agreed, especially the general, who seemed to be somewhat squeamish about witnessing an interrogation first hand, especially one involving an attractive female.

When Alex informed his superiors that he had apprehended a suspect, the death count at Karlshorst was already in the teens, and the seriousness and public nature of the attack demanded the attention of upper-level Soviet officials. At first, Alex was worried that the invariably suspicious senior brass might uncover the true instigators of the plot, but then he remembered what Meng had told him – if Wen said anything to discredit the KGB or Alex himself, it almost certainly would be rejected as untrue.

With the general, the colonel and their underlings safely ensconced in the observation booth, Alex signaled to Dmitri to begin the session. Dmitri was Alex’s best interrogator, a man so dedicated to his work that he had invented numerous devices to facilitate the process of breaking down prisoners. One of these inventions they would be using on Wen today.

Alex would be the session’s voice, asking the questions of his subject and providing commentary for his guests. Dmitri, as was his preference, would do the dirty work. Together, the two men had broken dozens of captives in the past. There was no reason to think they would fail this time – even if their hapless victim was innocent.

In the center of Room 1 was Dmitri’s latest creation, a large, wooden chair securely mounted on a dais rising about a foot from the tiled floor. Beside it stood a waist-high console which was connected to the chair by several electrical cables. More akin to a throne in size and appearance, the chair featured several unusual fixtures which Alex diligently explained to the onlookers in the observation booth.

One attachment, whose purpose seemed self-evident at first, was a round metal shaft rising from the chair’s seat. It was six inches long and two inches in diameter with a rounded crown. The phallic shape and position of the device made it clear that it was meant to penetrate whoever was unlucky enough to occupy the chair. For lack of a better word, the gleaming, vertical cylinder was a dildo.

“When we use this attachment on a male subject, it is somewhat limited, but with a woman, as you shall soon see, it is not only more versatile, but more effective as well.” Alex saw the men sitting behind the glass were all grinning broadly, even Guryev. “Now let me demonstrate how it works...”

Alex stepped behind the console, on which several switches and dials to control the chair were mounted. He turned one of the dials, and the metal shaft began to move. It rose up until it extended almost twice its original length from the seat, then descended to its initial position, only to surge up again, then drop, repeating the piston-like motion again and again. After Alex twisted a second knob, the speed of the apparatus increased significantly from a slow, steady rhythm to over two complete thrusts per second. The observers clearly were impressed, but a somewhat skeptical Lytkin turned on an intercom in the booth to communicate with Alex.

“That’s a splendid gadget,” he said with a laugh. “Perhaps you should market it to the public. I'm sure many women would pay a high price to have one in their bedroom. But how will it incite the prisoner to talk when it generates pleasure rather than pain?”

“Believe me Colonel, when the shaft reaches its maximum extension, no woman would become aroused with it inside her.” To better make his point, he stopped the device at its peak position so his audience could better appreciate the suffering it could inflict. “Even if that proves insufficient, there is another refinement...”

Alex flicked a switch on the console and seconds later, the metal rod began to buzz and crackle menacingly.

“It also can administer electric shock... variable voltage, delivered continuously or at preset intervals.” Alex saw the spectators nod approvingly. Lytkin was no longer dubious. “But the chair has more to offer than just this attachment alone.”

Alex continued the demonstration by pointing to a curved steel band, the ends of which were fastened to the chair’s back rest, one on each side. The band rose vertically, arching above the chair from one side to the other like an inverted U. However, this was not the attachment’s operating position.

“You see that this metal belt can be tilted forward,” Alex explained while moving it down until it extended horizontally in front of the chair. “Once the chair is occupied, this seemingly superficial accessory will encircle the subject at chest level. It may seem innocuous now, but once I engage the electric motor behind the chair’s back, you will see that this is indeed a most pernicious device.”

Alex returned to the console and flicked another switch. A whirring sound emanated from behind the chair and slowly, the steel band began to contract, tightening like an automated girdle. Anyone unfortunate enough to be in the chair would soon find the belt pressing against her chest and crushing her rib cage.

“But as always, there’s more to this attachment than you might expect,” Alex declared proudly. “Look closely at the inside of the band and you will see it is lined with over a hundred, needle-thin spikes, each about half an inch long. You can imagine what will happen when they reach a subject’s body. As with the mechanical dildo, we have found that this invention is particularly useful when applied to the fairer sex, particularly women as amply endowed as our current subject.”

“Thank-you for the presentation, Lieutenant.” General Guryev’s voice could be heard over the intercom. “Dmitri is indeed a creative designer of such... interesting playthings, but we are all eager to see them in operation, and even more anxious to hear what your captive has to tell us. Please... we are all busy men, so let us get this session underway.”

Alex realized his audience was getting restless. He cut short his introduction and nodded at Dmitri to prepare Wen for the interrogation. Not wanting to soil his uniform, Alex let his hefty assistant, who was dressed only in leather pants and army boots, move Wen’s sewage-smeared body onto the chair. As Dmitri untied Wen’s hands and lifted her up by the shoulders, Alex returned the metal dildo and the spiked band to their starting positions.

When Dmitri had Wen hanging limply over the chair’s seat, Alex helped him by spreading the woman’s legs and aligning her labia with the tip of the penetrating rod. Once she was in place, Dmitri dropped her onto the shaft, leaving her slumped on the chair, still dead to the world.

“I'm surprised that didn't wake her up,” said Alex, imagining what a woman must feel having a rigid metal phallus suddenly thrust inside her. “I guess we'll have to bring her around by force.”

“I know how to do that,” Dmitri said, “and how to get her cleaned up at the same time. But first, let’s get her tied down.”

The men clamped Wen’s wrists into two iron shackles bolted to the chair’s arm rests, then they locked her ankles into two more gyves attached to the front legs. A chain was wrapped around her midsection, securing her to the backrest, and another was looped around her neck to keep her head upright.

“There... all set,” Dmitri said, apparently satisfied. “Now I can bring her around.” He pulled a water hose from a corner of the room, unspooling it until he stood just two yards in front of the naked woman. He looked at Alex, then warned him to stand back.

Pointing the nozzle of the hose directly at Wen’s chest, Dmitri twisted the valve and unleashed a powerful, concentrated jet of ice cold water directly against her upper torso. It took less than a second for Wen to recover from her long reverie after being drugged by Meng.

“Aaaaiighh!!” she screamed. “Stop!! What the fuck! What... What is this? Where am I? Noooo!!”

Despite Wen’s protests, Dmitri let the deluge continue, moving the stream across her body to wash away the foul smelling muck which covered her. After inundating her for over a minute, he shut off the valve, leaving Wen soaking wet, shivering and completely disoriented.

“Uuunnggh...” she moaned. “What’s going on? Who are you? Where am I?”

“You are in the custody of the KGB,” said Alex stepping forward. “You are being held for terrorist acts against the Soviet people and for destroying assets in East Germany. Before you are executed for your crimes, we demand that you tell us everything about your involvement in the plot to destroy Karlshorst.”

“Executed? Karlshorst?” Wen was mystified. She squinted at Alex, and eventually recognized his face. “You... You're...”

Before she could finish, Alex smashed his fist into Wen’s left breast, knocking the wind out of her.

“You will not speak unless I ask you a question! And then, only to answer that question!” he shouted at her. “Do you understand?”

“Yes,” Wen replied in a muted voice. She tried to process what was going on, but remained hopelessly confused. “Yes, I understand.”

Chapter 27

Wen was watching the news. A television on a wheeled stand had been rolled in front of the chair so she could observe the devastation she supposedly had caused. Before Alex began the questioning, he wanted his subject to witness first-hand the crime she had committed.

On the screen, Wen saw the Karlshorst building, or rather what was left of it, engulfed in flames and surrounded by dozens of fire trucks and emergency vehicles. In horror, she watched badly burned bodies being carried to ambulances on stretchers. Scattered about the flooded pavement were severed limbs and other pieces of flesh which had been blown from people caught in the blast. Scores of firemen fought to contain the blaze, spraying water at the burning structure from all sides.

A well dressed woman, blonde and carefully coiffed, stepped in front of the camera, presenting a marked contrast to the chaos behind her. She raised a microphone and spoke directly to her viewers.

“Here’s the latest update on the tragic terrorist attack on Karlshorst, home of Soviet operations in East Berlin. As many know by now, less than three hours ago, a massive explosion ripped apart the main building, creating an inferno which continues unabated behind me. At first thought to be the result of a car bomb, it now has been determined that the blast originated inside the building, near its center. Experts say this will make it virtually impossible to identify the source of the explosion, given the tremendous destruction it caused. It also begs the question of how one or more large incendiary devices could be covertly brought inside what is perhaps the most secure facility in the city.”

Wen could not believe that these men thought she was behind this. What evidence did they have? Why her? And then she remembered being with Meng... being raped and tortured at the hands of Sung, Renshu and the colonel. Meng’s seductive interlude was a ruse to set her up, to incapacitate her and somehow turn her over to the Soviets to take the blame for this appalling attack.

It must have been Meng who executed the strike, she thought. But how could Wen convince her captors she was innocent? And would they even care whether they had the true culprit? If MSS was thought to be behind the incursion, perhaps any Chinese agent would make a convenient dupe to suffer the repercussions.

“At present, the official death count stands at 23,” the blonde reporter continued. “However, the toll is expected to rise, and as it was not known how many people were inside the building at the time of the blast, a final tally may never be available. Many of the bodies were burned beyond recognition, and those close to the center of the explosion may have been completely incinerated. Karlshorst was well-known to be a KGB stronghold, so many of the victims were likely members of the Soviet secret police. Among the few who have been identified is General Pavel Sochinsky, head of KGB operations in East Berlin. With the loss of such a high level official, the diplomatic ramifications of this incident will...”

Alex turned off the television and asked Dmitri to push away the stand.

“As you may expect,” he said, “your reckless actions will lead to a great many accusations, denials and political fear mongering. Clearly, it was your objective to trigger a confrontation between Russia and East Germany, as the latter most certainly will be the primary suspect. The East Germans of course will point to the West, who will claim they have nothing to gain from targeting the local KGB. No one will suspect the Chinese of course, and as relations dissolve between the established powers, MSS will take advantage of the destabilization by increasing its foothold in the East.”

“I... I don't know... I had nothing to do with this...” Wen pleaded.

Before she could finish, Alex had punched Wen again, this time plunging his fist into her right breast.

“I didn't ask you a question!” he shouted. “You must remember the rules, or this interrogation will be even more unpleasant for you than it already promises to be. We have all the evidence we need to prove you were involved, that in fact you were the one who detonated the explosion. Don't you remember? I caught you fleeing from the scene, and if that isn't enough to confirm your guilt, the documents and detonator I retrieved from your car provide a veritable mountain of proof.”

Wen desperately wanted to explain what really happened. She could see the Soviet officials glaring at her through the observation room window and guessed they did not know the true story. After hearing Alex lie about apprehending her and searching her “car”, she knew he too was in on the plot – that most likely he had conspired with Meng, Sung and Renshu, perhaps even others. But Wen knew that even if she were able to talk freely, the Soviets would not believe her if she accused the KGB agent who had brought her in.

But Meng, on the other hand... when Wen had the chance, she certainly could implicate Colonel Meng and take her down as well.

“Fortunately for us, you were betrayed from within your own organization.” Alex hovered menacingly over his prisoner. “And now that we do know the Chinese were to blame, all we need are the names of your co-conspirators, your leader, and the division which planned the operation. A single, low-ranking agent who was cajoled into detonating the blast is not enough to convince the politicians that the attack was orchestrated by MSS – but with details you can provide, I think we can persuade them to avoid confronting the East and West Germans in favor of those truly responsible.

“Now for some questions.” Alex signaled to Dmitri to stand behind the console. The bare-chested brute complied and, knowing his role well, he gave a slight twist to the dial controlling the shaft penetrating Wen. “I'm sure by now you must have felt a familiar sensation inside your pussy. You've done well to disguise that you are aware of the object’s presence, but it is time that you realize what it is capable of.”

“I know what a dildo is, you idiot. And if you think that’s going to get me to talk, you're going to be sorely disappointed.” Wen braced herself. She expected Alex to hit her again for speaking out of turn. But she was wrong. Instead, he simply nodded at Dmitri, who turned the dial further.

“Mmmmnngghh...” Wen moaned reflexively as the metal pole gradually extended deeper into her vagina. For a moment, it generated a pleasurable response, that of being sexually penetrated by a particularly strong and tenacious lover, but soon Wen realized she was being subject to something far more devious than forced sex. Her moan grew louder and transformed into whimper of pain. When the relentless cylinder reached its apex, having pushed through Wen’s cervix and into her uterus, she cried out in agony. Only when it descended again, did she breathe a sigh of relief.

“Now that you know what will happen when you displease me,” said Alex, “you may want to tell me what I want to know – the names of your comrades who helped you blow up Karlshorst... and the name of your leader.”

Wen wanted to shout out “Colonel Meng”, but realized that answering too quickly would cast doubt on her credibility. No... she would have to make it appear as if she was holding out, that she was resisting to the limits of her ability. It would not be an act. Wen’s tolerance for pain was low, and her worst fear as an agent had always been interrogation under torture. Still, she had to be strong.

“Fuck you!” she screamed. “I told you, I don't know anything.” A second later, she felt the shaft rise again, this time more quickly, causing greater distress as it tore into her delicate reproductive system. Her cry was more intense but she forced herself to remain defiant.

Dmitri left the dial set as it was, letting the apparatus operate continuously to send Wen into paroxysms of anguish every few seconds. She endured a dozen more strokes before she could take no more.

“I'll talk!! I'll talk!!” she wailed, her body jerking about despite her restraints.

“Give me names!” Alex shouted at her. “Who is your leader?”

“Meng! Colonel Meng!! She planned everything. I worked for her!” Wen expected that Alex would stop the machine – that the constant violation by the metal shaft would end. Instead, he signaled for Dmitri to increase the pace of penetration.

“You stupid bitch!” Alex yelled, before starting to laugh. “Meng works for us. She’s the mole who warned me about the attack. Now why would she do that if she was the one who planned it?”

Wen was devastated. It was the only card she could play, and of course Alex had anticipated she would play it. She should have known. If he and Meng were conspiring, Wen didn't have a chance. As Dmitri doubled the speed of the plunging phallus, Wen realized she had nothing else to offer, leaving her torture to continue indefinitely until she died being impaled on the unrelenting dildo. As the incredible pain radiated from her womanhood to every corner of her body, her mind was overwhelmed with agony and slowly she descended into darkness.

Chapter 28

Alex left Wen’s body to flop up and down on the thrusting pole, even after she had blacked out and become unresponsive. He knew that watching the naked woman bob limply like a broken puppet would delight his esteemed guests. Meanwhile he planned the next phase of her interrogation. Wen may have thought she had died riding the automated rape machine, but her torment was far from over.

Alex lowered the metal band, currently arching over Wen’s head. Once horizontal, it was positioned parallel to the prisoner’s chest, curving around her copious breasts, which wobbled enticingly as the metal shaft continued its oscillations.

“You can stop fucking her now,” Alex said to Dmitri. “But raise the dildo to its highest point. Then gradually tighten the compression belt until I give the signal.”

Dmitri slowed the shaft and waited until it reached full penetration before turning it off completely. Wen stopped convulsing and sagged against her bonds. As Dmitri twisted the knob to cinch the metal band, Alex adjusted it so the one inch wide loop aligned perfectly with the center of Wen’s remarkably round breasts. Just as the small steel spikes lining the inside of the band made contact with the woman’s full, distended nipples – the two points furthest from her sternum – Alex gestured for Dmitri to stop.

Alex noticed the deep gash just below where the band crossed Wen’s left breast. Although it had been hurriedly stitched up by Renshu, if the wound were to split open, it could prove problematic. Then again, given what Wen soon would be forced to undergo, the laceration would be a relatively minor complication.

“It’s time to bring her around,” said Alex. “Use the electricity.” He looked at the observation booth and was pleased to see that his audience was watching the session in rapt attention. Even General Guryev, who professed to “abhor torture”, had one hand resting on his crotch.

Dmitri flicked the switch to release the current through the metal phallus. Instantly, Wen’s body bolted upright, frozen by the powerful surge which flooded her nervous system. Her eyes and mouth opened wide, as if yanked agape by some unseen entity. A muted electronic hum emanated from her abdomen and the smell of nitric oxide filled the air.

A few seconds later, Wen let out a piercing shriek of anguish, one which did not let up until Dmitri finally cut the electrical current. As if drained of all energy, she slumped in the chair, stunned but awake. As her body moved forward slightly, Wen’s chest was pushed against the steel band and its needle-sharp spikes, forcing dozens of them against her bust.

“Yaaaiiighh!!” she screamed. “What the fuck?!!” She looked down as much as the iron chains around her neck would allow, and saw her bulging breasts ensnared by the metal girdle and the scores of skewers which studded its inside surface. “No no no no no...” she repeated. Instinctively she pushed back and sucked in her breath to move her breasts away from the spikes. She heard the whir of the motor behind her and watched terrified as the band drew closer. Wen continued to exhale, constricting her abundant bosom as much as possible. But there was only so much she could do.

Again, Alex let the belt tighten until the spikes had made contact with Wen’s fear-swollen nipples. He signaled Dmitri to stop. Desperately, Wen held her breath, knowing that inhaling would have devastating consequences.

“Names!!” Alex yelled. “Tell me who planned the attack on Karlshorst, and I'll have the belt pulled away. Tell me now!! You can't hold out forever!”

“Gh... ghhh... aaa...” Without air, Wen could only emit strangled gasps. But she did not nod her head or give any other indication that she was ready to speak. Instead, she managed to suck in her chest for almost two minutes, before submitting to her involuntary impulse to breathe in deeply.”

“Aaaaaiiiieeeggghh!!” Another ear-splitting scream filled the air as Wen’s expanding chest forced her breasts against the half-inch spikes, imbedding them fully into her soft flesh. Over half the skewers perforated her bosom, drilling dozens of small punctures into the sensitive tissue. Blood streamed from under the compression band and dripped onto her lap. The pain was staggering, and it was all Wen could do to keep from passing out once more.

“Now will you talk?” Alex barked at her. Wen’s head was tilted back, her expression a grimace of agony.

“Noooo...” she replied in a breathy voice. “I have nothing... nothing to tell you.”

“You fool.” Alex nodded at Dmitri, who turned the knob to further constrict the device encircling Wen’s chest. As her now familiar screams erupted anew, the metal belt began to tighten once more, inexorably squashing Wen’s pliable glands against her ribcage.

Chapter 29

With Dmitri deftly guiding the controls, Alex was able to draw out the compression band torture for almost two hours before Wen again succumbed to the stress and pain. Her eyes glazed over before closing, and her head leaned languidly to one side. Her gasps and raspy cries had ceased, and she was no longer responding to her tormentor’s questions – not that she had anything to say.

Alex examined the damage to Wen’s chest. The metal strip had been tightened to the point where it was all but buried in the flesh of the woman’s breasts, causing their upper and lower halves to bulge out grotesquely. Its thin steel edges had sliced through the skin, adding to the blood which was already flowing from the legion of punctures caused by the spikes. Wen’s torso and thighs were covered with a maze of crimson streams which crisscrossed their way down her body to eventually trickle into puddles on the chair and on the dais beneath it.

The extreme pressure of the band limited her ability to breathe normally. Instead, even in unconsciousness, Wen was forced to take shallow gasps, panting steadily as she fought to inhale enough oxygen to stay alive. Throughout the session, and despite its brutality, the attention of the KGB contingent in the observation booth never wavered. Alex was pleased that all the men remained focused on his work, some wiping their brows to cool their excitement. Colonel Lytkin leaned forward to talk into the intercom.

“That’s one tough bitch,” he said, unable to conceal his admiration. “Most women... hell, most men would have cracked by now.”

“Perhaps she really does not know anything,” suggested Guryev.

“That’s impossible,” the colonel replied. “She had the documents, and she was caught with the detonator within range of the target. How could she not know?”

“You may be right.” The general remained doubtful. “Still, as long as she lives, we have nothing to lose by continuing the interrogation.” He looked at his watch. “It is almost midnight, so we will resume tomorrow. We are all tired, and besides, the prisoner is in no position to tell us anything at the moment. We should let her recover overnight. Perhaps some time to consider her fate will help loosen her tongue.”

Guryev and the other visitors stepped out of the observation booth and thanked Alex for his efforts. All agreed to reconvene the following morning.

Dmitri reversed the motor to loosen the compression band and free Wen’s viciously crushed breasts, but Alex raised his hand, signaling him to stop.

“No... leave it. In case she comes to during the night, I want her suffering to continue. As the general said, it may make her more cooperative when we resume the session.”

Wen recovered a few hours before dawn, surprised yet again that she had not expired. Sitting alone in the dark and inundated with pain, she struggled to think of something – anything – she could reveal to her captors that finally would bring an end to her nightmare. She no longer feared death – in fact she welcomed it if it would deliver her from further torment – but she knew that these men could prolong her demise for days, even weeks if she did not tell them what they wanted to hear.

Yet not knowing a single detail about the plot of which she was accused, Wen had nothing to disclose, no matter how much she wanted to concede. All she knew was the truth, and then only some of it. Although it was unlikely to satisfy her ruthless assailants, and though Alex would naturally deny her statements, the truth is what Wen decided to tell. Perhaps the observers, one of the senior officers who were savoring every minute of her persecution, would consider what she had to say. It was her only chance.

A few hours passed before Alex and Dmitri returned. They seemed pleased that their subject had revived on her own, saving them the trouble of bringing her around by force – though Alex would not have objected to sending another powerful jolt into her body. About ten minutes later, Guryev, Lytkin and their associates arrived, clearly eager to witness the enchanting agent’s ordeal continue. As before, the KGB guests took their seats in the observation booth.

It was Saturday, and though the Barn had reopened to regular staff, only a handful of people had come in to work. The men in Room 1 and the groggy Asian suspect facing still more abuse at the hands of Alex and Dmitri would be able to proceed without fear of interruption.

“Now that you've had some time to think about your circumstances, slut...” Alex began by addressing Wen, “...give me the names of your fellow conspirators... give me the name of your leader!” He raised his hand, expecting to signal Dmitri to continue where they left off, tightening the compression band even further.

“Yes... I'll talk!!” Wen screamed. “No more... no more pain... I'll tell you everything...”

Her response took Alex by surprise. What could Wen possibly divulge, he thought.

As quickly as she could, Wen began to recount the plan to exchange money for the list of Soviet operatives, but before she could utter even a few sentences, Alex dropped his hand, summoning Dmitri to turn the dial.

“Aaaiiighggh... ack... uunggh...” Wen wheezed and choked as the metal belt sunk further into her breasts, constricting her chest and making it all but impossible to speak. There were two muffled cracks as her ribs began to snap.

“You fucking bitch! Enough of this bullshit! Tell me what I want to know!!”

“It... was... you!! You... and Meng!! You... fucking... bastard... “ Despite the relentless contraction of the device, Wen struggled to continue talking. “Alex... traitor...” she wailed between frantic gasps for air.

Alex quickly gestured to Dmitri, spinning his hand to get him to increase the speed of compression, digging the spikes deeper and deeper into Wen’s flesh as well as breaking two more ribs. She was unable to breathe and her severely squashed breasts seemed on the verge of bursting open. A sudden surge of urine spewed across the seat of the chair and onto the floor.

“Wait!” General Guryev’s voice bellowed over the intercom. “We will not learn anything if we do not allow the prisoner to communicate. Release the band enough so that she can speak. Even if what she tells us is nonsense, I wish to hear what she has to say.”

Reluctantly, Alex nodded at Dmitri, who loosened the spiked band just enough to allow Wen to talk. She sighed with relief, grateful that the tension on her chest had been allayed, even if only a little. And she was more thankful still that she had been given the chance to tell her story... to tell the truth.

It took Wen over fifteen minutes to explain what really had happened, at least the events that she knew about. Her body quivered and her voice cracked as she recounted the original plan to buy the list of Soviet agents, how that operation had failed, and how she had subsequently been accused by her own superior of conspiring with the KGB, when it was in fact Meng who was the traitor. Wen swore she never knew about the Karlshorst plot, that she was nowhere near the blast, and that Alex’s account of her capture was nothing but lies. She was careful not to mention the torture and execution of Svetlana, as she realized that information would not buy her any favors.

“A most interesting tale,” General Guryev said, scratching his chin thoughtfully. “It certainly is, um... possible...”

“What? How could you even consider such a farfetched fantasy?” Lytkin said, raising his arms in disbelief. “The slimy bitch has nothing and no one to support her claims... there’s no list of agents, and we have received no intelligence about anyone named Ragna or Nikolai. The only known people in her story are Alex and Meng, who not only are working for us – they just happen to be the individuals accusing her!”

“Yes, that is quite suspicious.” Guryev looked at Alex. The lieutenant had a spotless record, and a position which most other officers would envy. There was no reason for him to betray the KGB.

“And I remind you, General,” Lytkin continued, “the detonator was found in the Chinese woman’s car. She has not accounted for this most incriminating piece of evidence.”

“Unless it was Lieutenant Kandinsky who triggered the blast,” said Guryev. Alex’s heart skipped a beat.

For a moment there was silence as all eyes turned to him. Then Guryev let out an uproarious laugh, letting the others know he was joking. Of course the general would never accept the word of an enemy spy over a trusted comrade. The other men soon joined in Guryev’s laughter. As did Alex, relieved that no one believed Wen’s version of what happened. Colonel Meng had been right after all.

“No... you must believe me... please...” Wen’s pitiful pleas were lost amidst the raucous chortling of her tormentors. Eventually, the men’s cackles died down, and Guryev ordered that the interrogation proceed.

“This woman is responsible for the deaths of a great many KGB operatives,” he said sternly. “In order to prevent future attacks, we must find out more about this one... who coordinated it and who else was involved. If having her tits crushed only inspires her to invent imaginative fiction, perhaps we should try something else to pry the truth from this deceitful piece of trash.”

Chapter 30

As Dmitri reversed the compression band to move it away from Wen’s lacerated chest, Alex was surprised that the woman’s impressive breasts remained relatively round and well-proportioned despite the devastation they had endured. He had interrogated enough females to know that their most prized assets made for ideal targets, but they inevitably proved remarkably resilient. Still, Wen’s proud bosom had suffered more than most, and now bore the scars of her ordeal.

A one inch wide strip of punctures ran lengthwise across the center of her breasts, directly across her nipples, both of which were badly mangled. Blood spurted from many of the perforations, as well as from the indented furrows where the edges of the band had gouged into Wen’s flesh. As Alex had guessed, the existing wound on her left breast had ruptured, expelling bloody tissue as well as a strange, translucent gel. On closer inspection, he recognized that the odd substance was silicone.

“Looks like the bitch had implants,” Alex said snickering. “I knew those puppies were a little too perfect.” He grabbed Wen’s right breast and squeezed it, causing her to yelp in pain. More silicone oozed from her maimed nipple. “Sure enough... two bolt-ons – and we managed to pop both of them.”

“Looks like it'll be a while before she can resume her pin-up career,” said Dmitri. Once again, the other men laughed. With the compression band pulled out, Alex tilted it up and out of the way.

Wen sobbed. With her head forced upright, she could only see some of the damage that had been inflicted, but she knew that her femininity had been ruined. Not that it mattered, she thought. With luck, she would soon be dead and no woman would ever lay eyes on her again.

“Aaaaiiieeeeeeggghhh!!” Wen’s screams echoed implacably within the interrogation cell. The room had been designed to be soundproof, but it was not enough to keep the half dozen KGB staff in the central chamber from hearing the tortured agent’s bestial shrieks. Even after cutting the intercom, the KGB officials in the observation booth chose to cover their ears.

“That’s only thirty percent power,” said Dmitri, marveling at the extent of Wen’s agony with the device set at less than one third its capacity. Her body lurched against her restraints, then froze helplessly in place for as long as the current was running. As before, the conductor was the metal shaft rising from the chair’s seat, still extended to its maximum length and buried deep inside her. It was no longer set to thrust up and down like some demon lover, but instead, it now fired bolts of lightning directly into the center of Wen’s being – a torture more painful than any she had endured previously.

On Alex’s command, Dmitri cut the electricity after letting it flow for thirty seconds. Wen’s body went limp and drooped on the chair, but her anguished cries continued.

“Stop your hollering, you pathetic Chinese whore!” Alex shouted at her, his face just inches from hers. “As much as I enjoy hearing you scream, what I want is information. Tell me what you know about the Karlshorst attack! Tell me!”

Wen squirmed on the chair, trying in vain to move away from the enraged man bellowing at her. She knew there was nothing she could tell him that would make him stop, just as she knew that Alex himself was drawing out her suffering with no intention of getting her to talk.

Fully aware that she had been set up, Wen realized this so-called interrogation was a sham. Had the KGB brass not arrived, she would surely be dead by now. But with senior officers present to witness her questioning, Alex had to demonstrate that he had done everything possible to break her. Sadly for Wen, there was still more to come.

“You cocksucker,” she said softly, so only Alex could hear. “You know I can't tell you anything. If you have even a shred of decency, get this farce over with quickly and kill me...”

“Forty percent!” he ordered Dmitri, and stepped back from his subject. “This time, keep the juice going for a full minute. Make the bitch feel it!”

Wen’s eyes went wide with terror. Once more her body stiffened as she reacted to what felt like fireworks exploding in her abdomen. The constant hum of the device and the occasional electrical arc accompanied her torment, and her infernal screams again filled the room.

It was a living hell, and Wen was powerless to stop it. She could lie. She could tell the truth. She could remain silent. Nothing would satisfy Alex. All she could do was endure the pain, until at last, she could endure it no more.

“I don't understand,” said Alex, truly mystified. “No woman has taken the current at 75 percent without breaking. Even after three minutes at eighty, this fucking slut refused to crack.”

“Is she gone?” General Guryev turned on the intercom and asked the question that was on everyone’s mind.

After two hours of electro-torture, Wen’s apparently lifeless body was slouched in the chair, her head tilted back and motionless. Her eyes were half-closed and her blue-tinged tongue partially emerged from between her lips. Wisps of white smoke rose from her shredded genitalia. Midway through Wen’s last shock – the most powerful Dmitri had ever administered – the remaining contents of her bladder poured from between her thighs, a reflex usually signaling loss of muscular control and imminent death.

Alex walked up to Wen and felt for a pulse. Remarkably, her heart, though very weak, was still beating.

“She still lives,” he said. “Though I doubt she will survive much longer. Shall we continue the interrogation?”

“What’s the point?” Guryev’s voice was gruff, his frustration evident. “You could revive her again, but as she has remained uncooperative while enduring such extreme methods – and you said yourself that no woman has withstood this level of punishment – she likely will take her secrets to the grave. That is if she even has any secrets to share.”

“You think she may not know anything about Karlshorst?” Lytkin asked. “But how is that possible?”

“Maybe her only job was to detonate the blast. Maybe she was told nothing else about the attack.”

“That is most unlikely, given she had the plan documents with her when she was captured.” Lytkin easily shot down the general’s theory. “Besides, no matter how much she was told, she would know the name of her leader, the division she worked for, and more. Yet the bitch denies everything.”

“Well, that leaves only one alternative...” said the general with a deep sigh, “...something I do not wish to contemplate.”

“And that is?”

“The Chinese are able to train operatives to resist even our most sophisticated forms of interrogation.” Guryev shook his head. “And to think that before yesterday, we considered them to be no more than a minor threat.”

The last thing General Guryev needed in East Berlin was another adversary to threaten Soviet control. He already had to deal with the East and West Germans, the Americans, the Brits and the French, but now the Chinese were jockeying into position. The destruction of Karlshorst was only the opening salvo, an attack which he could neither publicly blame on his new enemy, nor ignore and brush off. All he could do was silently fume and plan retribution against MSS. In the meantime, he had to settle for one small opportunity to claim revenge.

Chapter 31

It was Dmitri’s expert opinion that if they left Wen on the chair, she would not live to see the following day. She had lost over a quarter of her blood, and more continued to seep from the numerous perforations and gashes in her breasts. Most likely, internal damage was even worse. Whatever organs the metal phallus had not ripped apart during its rapacious pounding, it had fried during the subsequent electrocution.

“She won't last long,” said Dmitri. “I can arrange to have her body shipped out for disposal tomorrow.”

“No!” Guryev growled. “I don't want her fading out leniently without suffering the consequences of her transgressions. She is a terrorist, one who not only attacked us, but refused to cooperate after being captured. She chose to be a spy, and so she will be dealt the fate of a spy – execution by firing squad. But I want her conscious. I want the conniving cunt to experience the agony of her obliteration – to feel each bullet rip into that luscious body of hers.”

Alex shrugged, but did not question the general’s orders. A formal execution was, in this case, a waste of time and money. They could easily have finished Wen on the spot with one final surge of electricity, or with a simple bullet to the head, but it was clear such measures would be too quick and merciful to satisfy Guryev’s wrath. Though Wen was doomed, the general felt defeated by the Asian minx, and so – if only to restore his own ego – he wanted to draw out her demise.

“Too bad the old goat doesn't know the truth,” Alex said to himself, savoring the futility of such a senior official consigning an innocent woman to death for the sake of his own vanity. It was a consummate final act to what had been a superbly executed operation.

With Wen’s interrogation officially over, Guryev, Lytkin and the other KGB visitors stepped out of the observation booth to thank Alex and Dmitri for their efforts. Having witnessed the entire session, neither the general nor the colonel could fault the two men for doing any less than their utmost to break the Asian woman.

“I would never have believed that a prisoner, a female no less, could resist such torture,” said the general. “But as she revealed nothing about the attack, it will be very difficult for us to convince the Soviet government that the Chinese were behind it. All we have is a relatively low level agent – one whom our best interrogators could not crack – and evidence which I suspect the politicos will say was planted. They want to believe it was an East German conspiracy to reduce Soviet influence in the city. Even I have to admit that is a much more plausible story than a supposed Chinese terrorist attack.”

“But that means we will be giving MSS exactly what it wants,” said Lytkin. “Destabilization... power struggles... and opportunities to establish a more militant foothold...”

“Of course. It is what the Chinese had planned all along, and it would seem they have won this battle.”

“But as for the war?” Lytkin asked.

“The war continues.” The general shrugged his shoulders and puffed on his cigar. “It’s just that we now have another opponent with which to contend.”

As per Guryev’s instructions, Wen was pumped with more than enough stimulants to bring her back to full consciousness. At first somewhat groggy, she soon had regained enough strength to offer meek resistance as Dmitri and Alex released her restraints and pulled her off the chair. Blood and gory shreds of tissue poured from her decimated sex as the two men dragged her from Room 1 and out of the Barn.

It was late Saturday afternoon, and except for a few guards the facility was deserted. The temperature had dropped below freezing, and icy, biting sleet pelted Wen’s naked body as she was unceremoniously hauled along a gravel strewn laneway to a ten foot high chain-link fence surrounding the Quonset complex.

Alex had called ahead to the armory, requesting that six sharpshooters equipped with fully loaded AK-47’s join him at the Quonsets. When he and Dmitri arrived with their bedraggled prisoner, the armed contingent was already there.

Shivering uncontrollably in the bitter cold, Wen was pushed against the fence and tied into position with rope. Her arms were raised up and pulled apart, then bound to the wire lattice at the wrists and elbows. Her legs were also splayed wide and secured at the ankles and knees, leaving her spread-eagled against the frigid steel grid. A final length of rope was pulled around Wen’s torso, just under her breasts, then tightened so as to keep her rigidly pinned to the fence.

Unlike others he had condemned to death in the past, Alex did not grant Wen a chance to say any final words, nor did he offer her a last cigarette – though it was unlikely she would have accepted one. He did not bother to provide her with a hood, or even a blindfold, as this time he did not want to do anything to ease the prisoner’s suffering. Alex had to make it appear that he believed Wen truly was responsible for the deaths of his KGB comrades. She deserved no mercy... no pity... only the wretched misfortune one would wish on one’s worst enemy.

The gunmen formed a horizontal row, facing their target from twenty feet away. They knew their job well, and as executions at the facility were routine to say the least, the squad did not need further instruction.

It was commonplace for female prisoners to be dispatched in the nude, but the soldiers had never before fired on an Asian captive, nor a woman as bloodied and battered as this one. Though many wondered about the circumstances leading up to her termination, none dared ask about it. The men all knew Alex and trusted him. They were paid to do their work without questioning superior officers.

“Unnnghhh...” Wen groaned, her body shuddering. “No. Not... like... this...” The drugs served to intensify her pain and speed up her heart. Her mind was overwhelmed by dread and panic.

But Alex took his time, signaling the sharpshooters to hold their fire.

“C’mon Alex, I'm freezing my fucking balls off here,” said Dmitri. “What’s the hold up?”

“Patience.” Alex waited another minute until a long, black ZiL limousine drove up the laneway and stopped next to the men. When the driver flashed the car’s headlights, Alex continued.

“On the count of three,” he said, “fire at will.” The soldiers raised their rifles, all set to semi-automatic so as to fire only one round with each pull of the trigger.

“One... Two... Three...” Alex counted, as Wen began to scream.

Her cries instantly were cut short as the bullets slammed into her flesh.

The firing squad discharged their weapons quickly but steadily, releasing one or two rounds per second, as they had been taught to do. Few of the gunmen missed their mark, so following a five second salvo, Wen’s body had been riddled with over forty bullets. Some wayward shots had hit her thighs, arms and head, but most of the slugs had pierced her breasts, midsection and the inviting V of her womanhood.

Wen uttered an involuntary death rattle and slumped against the ropes. Her head dropped forward and a geyser of blood spewed from her mouth and covered her chest. A second later, more blood erupted from the dozens of perforations in her torso, progressively covering her in a glistening glaze of crimson fluid. This time, Alex did not need to check for a pulse. It was obvious that the once beautiful Asian agent had perished instantly.

The driver of the ZiL emerged from the car and walked around it to open the back door. Dressed in a bulky coat and wearing a fur hat, General Guryev exited the vehicle and walked toward Wen’s nude corpse stretched out on the fence. In one hand, he held his trademark cigar. In the other, he carried a Makarov 9mm pistol.

Guryev walked past Dmitri and Alex without acknowledging them, continuing on until he stood directly in front of Wen’s body. For a moment, he traced the barrel of his gun along the dead woman’s curves, eventually letting it hover over her mutilated pussy. He dipped the toe of his boot into the large puddle of blood which had formed between her spread legs and shook his head.

“You stupid piece of shit,” he said, unable to disguise his hostility. “Do you still think what you did was worth it?”

Guryev dragged the Makarov upwards until its muzzle was nestled in the cleavage between the remnants of Wen’s breasts. He pulled the trigger eight times, emptying the magazine into her chest.

“I know that didn't hurt you, bitch, but it made me feel a little better.” The general turned and walked back to the limousine, stopping briefly next to Alex.

“Leave her hanging there until she starts to rot, then have her carted out with the weekly trash for incineration.”

Alex nodded. For an instant he shivered, not because of the cold, but on realizing that if Meng’s plan had not been successful, Wen’s gruesome fate could easily have been his own.

Chapter 32

“Tell me again how the bitch died,” Colonel Meng cooed on the telephone, both lust and venom apparent in her voice. She was stretched out on her couch in the Yellow House, the same couch on which she had forcibly seduced Wen just 24 hours earlier. Once again Meng was naked, but this time she was alone, pleasuring herself as Alex described Wen’s grisly torture and ultimate execution. Meng would have given anything to have personally witnessed the woman’s slow extermination, but of course that was not possible. Instead, Alex’s first-hand account would have to suffice.

For the third time, Alex repeated the tale of Wen’s ordeal. He didn't mind. The sound of Meng’s heavy breathing as she masturbated was enough to make him reach for his groin and massage his stiffening penis. It was a perverse form of phone sex, and a most appropriate way for the two conspirators to celebrate the culmination of their efforts.

Alex was alone in Room 1. He had dismissed Dmitri and as promised, had called Meng to let her know the final stage of their plan had been completed. In the end it had all come together even better than they had expected. Alex looked around the interrogation cell, making sure to describe even the smallest details of Wen’s torture for Meng’s amusement – including the smell of burnt flesh which still hung in the air, and the pool of blood and urine under the chair.

When Alex mentioned that Wen’s carcass remained on display, spread out on the chain-link fence and slowly freezing solid, Meng could no longer contain herself. She came to a powerful climax, her fingers fervidly massaging her drenched genitalia.

“God... Oh yes!! Fucking hell!” she cried out with carnal abandon. “Oh Alex... that was wonderful. But I need to see you. I can't go another day without feeling that cock of yours inside me...”

“Later tonight,” said Alex. “Ten o'clock at the Hotel Metropol on Friedrichstrasse.”

“I can't wait,” Meng purred. “We have a lot to celebrate, so I suggest you bring the finest champagne you can find.”

“And you?” Alex asked coyly. “What will you bring?”

“A pair of stiletto boots, a fur coat, and nothing else.”

Alex felt his heart speed up. It was hard for him to believe that he, a once loyal KGB lieutenant, had not only turned on his country, but was sexually involved with a Chinese spy. That this woman was an MSS colonel with a seemingly insatiable appetite for sex and sadism made his relationship with Meng even more astonishing. But there was no denying their chemistry. Not to mention that since falling under Meng’s spell, Alex’s finances had undergone extraordinary growth. If nothing else, being a double agent certainly paid well.

With his thoughts slipping from sex to money, and with Meng at least temporarily sated, Alex asked about his compensation for playing a key role in the destruction of Karlshorst.

“Have you heard from your people regarding my remuneration?” he asked. “After all, by now the success of our plan is international news...”

“So my divine body is not sufficient reward for your work?” Meng said playfully.

Alex laughed. “You certainly hold yourself in high regard, but even your tight pussy isn't worth five million dollars.”

“Trust me, the money will be transferred to your account as soon as the paper-pushers in Shanghai confirm there are no loose ends.”

“How can there be any?” Alex sounded exasperated. “You and I and your two minions are the only people in East Germany who know what really happened. I even made sure the two grunts who delivered the bodies were in the building when I blew it up. General Guryev himself told me the East Germans will take the blame for this.”

“Don't worry. Along with the generous bonus for this mission, you will also receive a twenty thousand dollar monthly stipend as long as you continue to work for us. As proof of our good faith, the first deposit has already been made.”

“And should I decide to retire?” Alex knew the answer to this question, but he wondered if Meng had the fortitude to tell him.

“As I'm sure you are aware, pensions for counterspies are not very attractive. But just so we're clear on this, should you ever decide to leave MSS – or me – I will have you killed.” There was a brief silence, and then Meng added, “Of course, I'll make sure you die with a smile on your face.”

They both laughed and ended the call.

Epilogue

Meng got off the couch and walked to the bar. She dropped some ice cubes into a lowball glass, then filled it almost to the brim with Glenlivet. As she sipped her drink, she wondered about her own compensation for orchestrating what was undoubtedly the most ambitious incursion by China into Communist Europe.

It had been Meng’s idea and Meng’s plan, and though her superiors initially were concerned about the potential pitfalls of such an aggressive assault, when they realized that the ministry’s low profile in East Germany would work to their advantage – making it unlikely that China would be blamed – they agreed to fund the project. Five million US dollars may have been a fortune to a KGB cog like Alex, but given the stakes, it was a petty expense for MSS.

Like Alex, Meng had been promised financial rewards if the Karlshorst attack proved successful – but more importantly, the ministry brass had suggested she would be promoted to direct MSS operations across East Germany. Now that she had accomplished what she had set out to do, it seemed Meng was guaranteed the power she craved. She drank the Scotch greedily and fondled herself with her free hand. It all seemed too good to be true.

Suddenly, a commotion outside her office shook Meng out of her reverie. She heard what sounded like four muffled gun shots, followed by two loud thumps.

“Sung! Renshu! Get in here!” Perhaps the pair had become bored and were horsing around at their posts. It would not have been the first time.

But neither of the two men entered the room. Instead, the door slowly opened, and Meng found herself facing a statuesque brunette, a woman attired in a skin-tight, black cat suit and matching boots. In her right hand, the intruder held a silencer equipped Glock 17 which was pointed directly at Meng’s naked body.

“Who the fuck are you?” Meng said, then called again for Renshu and Sung. “Come to my office you idiots, and take out this bitch.”

“Your two guards are dead,” the brunette said coolly. “And you clearly are in no position to defend yourself, so I suggest you do exactly as I say... if you want to live of course. You can begin by taking a few steps closer to me.”

Meng put down her drink and did as she was told. She glanced at her side arm, which lay on the coffee table, just out of reach.

“Okay, that’s close enough. And don't even think of going for your gun. I'll waste you long before you get to it.”

“What do you want from me? How did you find this place?” Ordinarily, Meng was comfortable being naked, but standing totally nude and unarmed just a few yards away from this formidable woman... she had never felt so exposed and vulnerable.

“I want you to tell me where I can find Lieutenant Alex Kandinsky.” The brunette pulled down the zipper of her suit to reveal an appreciable amount of her deep cleavage, a move intended to further assert her dominance over the more modestly endowed Meng – even though the Glock was more than sufficient to indicate who was in control.

“Alex? Why? What’s this about?” Meng was very confused. She did not recognize this brazen trespasser, and had no idea how a stranger would know about her connection to Alex.

“My name is Valentina Toporkoa. Perhaps that will answer your questions.”

Meng gasped. She was looking at the seventh KGB spy, the honey trap who had eluded Alex. “You... you knew. But how?”

“Don't be an idiot,” Valentina said with disdain. “It’s my job to dig up information, don't you remember?” She ran a hand over her bulging bust line. “With what I have to offer, I can find out just about anything from any man... or woman. Though I admit most of my clients are Soviet, East German or from the West, lately I've become friends with several senior MSS officials. It seems you people like to fuck just as much as the others... if not more.”

“You were tipped off. We knew that...”

“Oh come now. When six of my colleagues disappeared in just a few days, I didn't need any tips. Of course I knew something was up. I went into hiding, but I kept working... and I called in a few favors. When I heard about the Karlshorst blast, it all came together. You're the mastermind, and Alex did the grunt work. He killed six of my friends, and as long as I'm at large, he will hunt me down as well.”

“No. No, he won't,” Meng pleaded. “I can tell him not to go after you. I... I'll say I killed you. We'll stage your death.”

“Interesting proposal... but I think not.” Valentina shook her head. “I really won't get a good night’s sleep until I know Alex Kandinsky is gone forever. Now be a good girl and tell me where he is.”

“I don't know.” Meng was trembling. If Valentina intended to kill Alex, she surely wasn't about to let Meng live. “We finished the operation today. I don't know where he went...”

There was a muffled bang as the brunette’s Glock discharged. The bullet burst into Meng’s groin, just two centimeters above her vagina. She shrieked and fell to her knees, both hands clutching the wound. She looked down and moaned as she saw blood seep between her fingers.

“That was not the answer I want to hear.” Valentina’s voice was cold and unsympathetic. She tilted her weapon down to take aim. “I'll have you know the KGB trained me well. I was top of my class in marksmanship. Before I demonstrate, I'll give you another chance to tell me where Alex is.”

“He... he left the country,” Meng looked up, balancing precariously on her knees. “He’s defecting to China...”

Pffft! Valentina fired a second shot, this one striking lower than the first. Meng let out a deafening scream.

“Ouch...” Valentina said with a sneer. “Right in the cunt. I'll bet that hurt.”

Meng fell backwards, her body quivering on the floor as her eyes stared blankly at the ceiling. A fountain of blood and piss erupted from between her badly torn labia. Valentina straddled her victim, then lowered herself to squat on Meng’s waist. She pushed her gun against the Chinese woman’s left breast, completely entrapping her tiny nipple under the barrel.

“I really don't know why you're opting to protect that murderous bastard,” Valentina said. “But if you want to play this game, I can drag it out for hours... and in the end, you'll give in anyway. So why not save yourself a whole lot of pain and agony, and tell me where he is now.”

Meng knew she was finished. And if she went down, she might as well take Alex with her.

“He'll be at the Hotel Metropol at twenty-two hundred,” she said, shivering. “He'll be expecting me... wearing a fur coat...”

“Now that’s more like it. And so very convenient for me.” Valentina smiled.

“Please...” Meng whispered. “Please make it quick...”

“As you wish, bitch.” Valentina pulled the trigger, blowing apart Meng’s breast and sending a slug through her chest and into the floor. The Soviet spy stood up and watched the nude woman’s body convulse for almost half a minute. When at last the colonel’s death spasms ended, Valentina fired a final bullet into Meng’s forehead. She was not one to take chances.

The explosion of her victim’s breast had splattered Valentina’s cat suit with blood. “Now I have two reasons to change into something more appropriate,” she said with a laugh, stripping off the tight outfit, leaving her naked except for her boots.

She opened a large, antique armoire and flipped through Meng’s impressive collection of designer clothes. As she expected, Valentina discovered a full-length sable coat. She tried it on, luxuriating in the feel of the soft fur against her bare skin.

“A little small, but more than satisfactory,” a pleased Valentina said to herself. “It even has a hood. That certainly will prove useful.” She finished Meng’s Scotch and poured herself a refill. It was only seven o'clock, and she did not have to be at the Metropol until ten.

“I guess I have a few hours to kill... or rather, a few hours until I kill.”