FOREIGN PRISON

Chapter 37


President Gerov's eyes concentrated on the live video stream on his computer screen, his lips curled in a smile, as he watched his former wife and former daughter taking their daily bath together, the highlights on their wet skin seeming to sparkle on the screen. Yelena sat in the tub behind Marya, her legs wrapped around Marya's waist and her ankles crossed in front. She had used a washcloth to soap Marya's chest, but had discarded the washcloth and now gently and slowly massaged her daughter's soapy breasts with her open palm. Yelena's other hand, her right, reached down to brush fingers from side to side on Marya's sex lips, below the waterline. Marya, leaning back against Yelena's breasts, was reaching down to her own crotch to cover Yelena's hand as it moved to stimulate her. Yelena seemed to be getting her own stimulation by grinding her sex rhythmically against Marya's buttocks, the water gently sloshing back and forth in time with her hip thrusts. Marya, her head turned towards Yelena's, eyes half lidded and mouth open, sucked her mother's offered tongue into her mouth, her cheeks hollowing with the effort, then released it to lick around Yelena's lips before resuming an intense kiss. Both women were breathing in gasps and moaning, obviously near orgasm.

The president had laughed aloud when Doctor Tourachev had informed him how distraught Yelena had been when she had complained to him that she had become completely unable to control herself sexually with her daughter, blaming it on the medication she had been using to facilitate arousal, only to be told that the medication was no longer responsible. The president could well imagine how horrified Yelena must be. He himself had loved the girl, once upon a time, and had shared with Yelena, as all parents did, the fear of Marya falling victim to a sexual predator such as Yelena herself had now become.

As madly passionate as the two of them seemed as lovers, the president knew that it was Yelena's fear of condemning Marya to endless agony, and Marya's fear of a terrifying death in the snake pit, that kept them motivated. That was as it should be. Fear, Dimitri Gerov knew, was the great motivator.

So rapt was he, watching the intense counterfeit sexual ardor, that he was startled by the beep indicating a call coming in. The president was annoyed by the interruption, until he saw that the signal was coming from General Karozki. The president minimized the video feed, noting the time so that he could watch a replay of it later, and clicked the button to open the conference with the general. The president exclaimed, "Vitaly Alexeyevich! I am very much indebted to you." He looked to the side, where his mannequins were putting on a very imaginative and disgusting display. "I'm sure the American girl is glad she came to our country. Oh, and please pass on my best wishes to the doctor. He has done a marvelous job, both with the Gerova women and the mannequins here."

The general looked cheerful. "I'm just grateful for the opportunity to serve, Mr. President. Let me tell you why I wanted to talk to you..."

"Please."

"We have been considering another execution, and of course, normally we would just go ahead. But as it involves another celebrity, I wanted to check with you first. Let me apologize again for killing the Forrest girl."

The president waved his hand. "All in the past. But go on about this latest case."

"Yes, sir. It's Irina Novocheva." The general was pleased to see the president gasp at the mention of the name. He had known the president would have an interest in this one.

Irina Novocheva. Of course, thought the president, the general would automatically know I'd want to hear any information about her.

Novocheva had been the star of Irkhetnia's national women's ice hockey team, and the focus of an outburst of national pride. She had scored both goals in Irkhetnia's upset victory over Spain in the preliminary rounds of the European championships two years ago, the first win at the continental level for the tiny country in any sport. Earlier this year at the Olympic qualifying tournament, Irkhetnia had again won a game, over Latvia, with Novocheva scoring three goals. She had scored four more combined in their other three games, all losses. Irkhetnia had failed to qualify for the Olympics, but Novocheva had become a national hero.

Just after Irkhetnia's elimination from the qualifiers, the president's security forces had, as they sometimes had in the past, spread a rumor that any player wishing to defect to the U.S. could meet with a representative of an American sports magazine, who would make the arrangements. To their shock, Novocheva had showed up. Normally the discipline for such an offense would be to dismiss the athlete from the national team, on the grounds of inadequate play, avoiding any suggestion that the athlete had attempted to betray the nation. But such a move was impossible with Novocheva. No one in Irkhetnia would accept any conceivable explanation for Novocheva being kicked off the team. Yet if the incident had been allowed to pass without consequence, Novocheva could easily, and probably more carefully, have found a more successful way to defect. To lose an athlete of her national popularity would be a political disaster.

So, with regret, the security police, on orders directly from the president, had staged a food poisoning incident at the hotel where the team had been staying, on their last night before returning home. Several athletes were ill for a day -- it served them right for losing, the president had reasoned -- but only Novocheva had "died."

The president had been taken aback by the magnitude of the ensuing outbreak of national mourning. Mountains of flowers had built up outside the capital's ramshackle hockey arena, and at the building of the national sports federation. Grown men had wept in the streets.

No doubt, the president thought cynically, the crying men had imagined Novocheva might have been their lover, if only she had lived.

The president found his voice. "And you wanted to execute her??"

The general explained, "Well, we would have, if it had been anyone else. The girl has been increasingly hard to discipline. She seems not to care about the pain anymore. She's refused a number of direct orders lately, despite whippings. Meanwhile, she actually seems to enjoy being made to fight another prisoner, and the guards don't find it very entertaining when the prisoner wants to do it." The general chuckled. "The guards refer to her as 'the Amazon.' I'm sure you can imagine why.

"At any rate, as one type of punishment, the guards have often made her have sex with another inmate, and she's always hated that -- in fact, by coincidence, I'm told she once spent an entire night intimately tied up with the Preston girl -- but now she refuses to do it, even when she's whipped for refusing."

The president was not at all surprised by Novocheva's loathing of sex with another woman. She had actually had one of her teammates kicked off the hockey team because the girl had come on to Novocheva sexually -- Novocheva had told the coaches that either the girl must be removed from the team, or Novocheva would quit. The ultimatum had accomplished its goal.

The general went on, "She has apparently decided she can handle the pain of the whippings. Our most common way of dealing with that is to punish someone she cares about, but there is no prisoner here who fits that description. Novocheva was sent here alone rather than as part of a group, and hasn't made any attempt to bond with another inmate. I believe she has decided either that she wants to die, or else that we don't dare kill her. Either way the outcome is the same: she doesn't think she has anything to lose. Quite frankly the guards are tired of having to bother with her.

"As one last attempt to regain some control over her, we put her in solitary a week ago. Normally after a few days in solitary, an inmate alternates long periods of stupor with outbursts of hysterical crying. Here is some video of Novocheva, from day six."

An image filled the screen, of Novocheva in ghostly green. The president knew that Novocheva was living in complete darkness, visible only by special night-vision cameras sensing body heat.

For a moment, the president saw an image of Novocheva at rest in the tiny room, her arms stretched up over her head, her legs drawn up against her butt, all enforced by shackles and chains. He was familiar with the rooms used for solitary, and the manner in which the inmates were restrained there.

But the girl was only motionless for an instant. Novocheva seemed to be a bundle of energy, carrying out a determined exercise program. For several minutes she did deep squats, her arms pulled above her head each time she went down, using only her leg muscles to raise and lower herself; then she switched to pull-ups, using arm strength alone to lift her body and let it back down. Then she faced the wall and kept her entire body straight and rigid, at an angle against the wall, longer than the president would have thought humanly possible. Then she did some sort of crunches to maintain her abdominal muscles...

The president, watching the video images, could barely breathe. He had never seen Novocheva naked before. She was an incredible physical specimen. Amazon indeed. So strong, and yet so overwhelmingly sexual.

The image of Novocheva faded, and the general reappeared. "Clearly solitary is not having the desired effect. I think she actually enjoys it more than life in the cell block. If she builds up her body much more, I'm not sure how many guards it would take to subdue her."

The president found it hard to speak. The image of that fantastic body was still up front in his imagination. "Ummm... So what do you propose doing?"

"Well, we do have one stronger level of punishment, but I hesitate to use it, as it has permanent damaging psychological effects. But as an alternative to that, it occurred to me to wonder whether you might want her as one of your mannequins."

The president sat suddenly bolt upright. Why did I never think of that?? he wondered. He had been focused on using the two American girls for that from the moment the doctor had first mentioned the process. After the execution of the Forrest girl, the president had accepted Preston's suggestion of the diminutive Anya Simonina as an acceptable substitute. And indeed, Preston and Simonina together had been a genuine treat.

For reasons unknown to himself, he had somehow never thought of Novocheva in that context. But the possibilities raced through his mind now.

In a croak quite unlike his usual voice of authority, he said, "Yes! Tell the doctor he should start on this at once! Tomorrow... No, today, if he can. Can I expect delivery in two months?"

"Doctor Tourachev says he has found some new efficiencies in the process. He believes it can be completed in six weeks now."

"Excellent. Well..." He gestured emphatically with his hand. "Tell him to begin!"

"Yes, sir. I had actually expected you would say that. The doctor and I were just awaiting your approval."

"Oh! Can you easily enough render Novocheva unconscious in her cell in solitary, without her awareness? Using a gas, for example? And of course, as with Preston and Simonina, she should retain no memory of her mannequin treatment."

"Yes, sir. Would you like us to do that?"

The president nodded eagerly. "I would like her simply to awaken as a mannequin without knowing how or why. I will explain it to her after."

The general smiled. "Excellent, sir. I shall go now and tell the doctor to get started. I'll pass along your request about the gas, of course. That will not be a problem."

The president was about to close the communication, but then remembered. "The doctor asked me to let him know whether any of the nurses caring for the mannequins had an especially intense reaction to the video segment involving snakes. He didn't tell me why, but you can pass along to him that the nurses seemed appropriately appalled, but the artist, Celenskaya, was overwhelmed by that segment in particular. At least that is what my surveillance team told me." The president looked a little puzzled. "Can you tell me why he was interested?"

"I'd have to ask him, sir. Will there be anything else?"

The president barely heard the general, as visual images from Novocheva's exercise session paraded through his head. "What? No, no, that is all." He terminated the connection.

Novocheva as his own mannequin! It was almost too much to contemplate.

It occurred to him immediately that he would have to change the venue for the mannequin operation. It wouldn't do to take a chance on any of the personnel in the mansion discovering that Novocheva was not only alive, but right here. He would move to his dacha, his vacation home in the woods forty kilometers outside the city, where he had more privacy and a much smaller staff. He would make arrangements immediately for remodeling that would create a place of confinement for the artist, Larisa Celenskaya, and the nurses. Since he transacted most of his daily business by videoconferencing anyway, he decided he would take up residence at the dacha indefinitely.

He reclined in his chair, daydreaming, the video of the women in his former family forgotten for the moment. So Novocheva doesn't mind pain, he thought, but she hates sex with women. He would need to direct Celenskaya to create some positions with far more emphasis on sensuality than pain. Novocheva would spend each day as Preston's passionate lover. He would also give strict orders that, on those days when he had to come into the city, or the rare occasions when he traveled, Preston and Novocheva should be kept constantly kissing and entangled in a lovers' embrace during his absence. Their nights should be spent the same way. Just imagine, he thought, how much misery for Novocheva! How she would wish she had not been so contrary with the guards!

He sat up suddenly. He was neglecting to consider Preston's reaction. He put through a signal to Karozki, and was delighted when Karozki completed the connection immediately. The president favored his general with a smile. "Still hard at work at your desk, I see, Vitaly Alexeyevich. I realized I did have another question."

"Yes, Mr. President."

"I know that Preston and Forrest were traveling together, of course, but I haven't paid that close attention to their background. Were they lesbian partners? Anything like that?"

"All indications are against it, sir. In fact, if you'll permit me to look at some transcripts..." The president waited as the general moved off-screen. He could hear what sounded like a file drawer opening.

The general returned to the screen holding a file folder, which he opened, shuffling through its papers. After a time, he said with satisfaction, "Yes, here it is. I was remembering correctly. During the night they spent in the hotel before their arrests, there was some discussion of sleeping arrangements. As there was only one bed, Preston volunteered to sleep on the floor, and apparently followed through on that offer. Neither considered for a moment sharing the bed." He closed the folder. "I can also tell you that our Sergeant Kodorov told me that the night Preston and Novocheva spent tied together took place due to a fight between them, and that Preston seemed as appalled by the intimacy as Novocheva was. There was one other occasion of Preston having sex with another inmate, in her cell, but that was also coerced, as is normally the case here. Again, she appeared very upset when she was told what she would have to do." He held up the folder. "In any case, all the evidence we have suggests Preston has no sexual attraction to women. She did form a bond with Simonina, but nothing we know implies that it was sexual in nature. Many of the inmates here pair off as friends, in self-defense against the stressful living conditions. Of course, we find that just gives us greater leverage in punishing them."

The president smiled. "Once again, you are very helpful, Vitaly Alexeyevich. Please keep me informed about Novocheva."

"You will know everything as soon as I do, Mr. President."

The president signed off, sighed, and sat back again. It was perfect. The mannequins Novocheva and Preston as lovers, frozen in intimacy very unwelcome to both of them.

He realized he was not visualizing a role for the Simonina girl. Well, he decided at last, her service really has run its course. Her combination with Preston -- the president looked once more across the room at the bizarre contortion Celenskaya had arranged for them today -- had been very satisfying, but he found that he much preferred the image of Preston and Novocheva together. It amused him to think that, according to the general, the two women already "knew" each other in a relationship far different from the jailhouse friendship of Preston and Simonina.

Yes, he decided, once Novocheva had been delivered in her mannequin state, there was no more need for Simonina. He would have her terminated... Oh, now wait, he thought. It shouldn't simply be a matter of killing her. The opportunity should not be wasted. No, Anya Simonina should die in a very imaginative way.

He was sure Celenskaya was up to it.

He would, he suspected, tire of Novocheva and Preston as well after a few months. What to do with them after? As the celebrated sports star and the one American, respectively, in custody, he didn't want simply to execute them.

Ahh! The president smiled at his inspiration. The perfect thing!

The president knew exactly what that "other punishment" was, the one the general had said caused "psychological damage."

He would send Novocheva and Preston back to the prison. Once they recovered full movement -- with no memory of the recovery period, of course -- they could spend a week or two in The Farm. Then, under threat of being returned to The Farm for an extended period, a year, say, they could be made to do anything. They might put on regular shows for all the men, in which they fought each other with fists until first blood, and then had passionate makeup sex. Or they might walk around the stage on hands and knees, barking like dogs and licking each other's anus. Perhaps the general could find something they would hate even more. They would do anything to avoid The Farm.

With no further need for their services, Celenskaya and the three nurses could simply be sent off to the prison, to be treated as the general saw fit.

Smiling, he took one more admiring look at Preston and Simonina. Celenskaya had made use of the bondage equipment again. Three IV stands, leaning together, were tied together at the top to make an ingenious tripod, from which a rope dangled. Simonina, face down, was the target of the rope: at its lower end it bound her wrists and ankles all together in a severe hogtie, raising them upward and bending her torso backward. Her stomach rested in Preston's lap. Without Preston underneath for support, Simonina's bondage would have been very stressful indeed -- she might not quite have reached the floor, with the rope suspending her as a circular wreath of human flesh. While Preston, in that sense, was saving Simonina from considerable pain, she was making up for it in other ways. Her right index finger burrowed down between Simonina's tightly-clenched buttocks and into the girl's rectum, while the fingers of her left hand pinched Simonina's nearer breast in a way that had to be quite painful. It was as though Preston found Simonina an interesting toy to play and experiment with.

Sighing with a smile, the president returned to his computer screen and reopened the video. Yelena and Marya were relaxing in the tub now, Yelena's arms around Marya as the girl, half-turned now, rested her head on her mother's breasts, eyes closed. The president clicked for a replay of the last ten minutes. The orgasms were always entertaining, and he didn't want to miss them. He had a mountain of paperwork, but it could wait.

*   *   *   *   *

Anya tried to stay positive, pushing away the gloom enfolding her. The president's conversation with the general had been very upsetting.

The pain in her arms, butt, and breast actually helped a little. She preferred to focus on that, rather than what she had just heard.

Anya had strongly suspected her dreams of holding, kissing, making love with Retchell in freedom were impossible. Retchell was a beautiful woman who had probably enjoyed the attentions of many men. She couldn't desire a woman, thought Anya, especially not a tiny mouse like me. And now Anya had just heard the general's voice coming out of the president's computer, confirming her fears: Retchell had no romantic interest in women.

It doesn't matter! she insisted to herself. It's okay if she doesn't want me that way.

Anya reminded herself that Retchell had told her she loved her, on that wonderful day that was always at the forefront of her memory. And Anya had sworn to herself, that day, that she would never again doubt Retchell's love for her. Also, Anya remembered, Retchell had only a few days ago declared her love again, that night when the two of them had talked with their eyes. Love and sex aren't the same, Anya told herself. I'd much rather have love.

Anya usually avoided letting her memory touch on that awful night at the prison, when they'd hurt her shoulders and crotch so badly with those ropes, and Retchell had picked that other woman -- Kristina, Anya remembered now, that's what she'd said her name was -- to share her cell and make love with her all night, while Anya suffered right in front of them. And the big guard had told Kristina that Retchell was a lesbian. Anya now knew, from hearing the general, that Retchell preferring women had all been a lie, compounding Anya's present disappointment. Though on the brighter side, the general said that they had forced Retchell to do what she did with Kristina, that Retchell had no feelings for the girl. Anya had figured that out, but it was nice to hear it confirmed. Anya wanted to be special to Retchell.

Making herself, once more, stop dwelling on that night, Anya thought back to another, much better memory, that day in the general's office, when she and Retchell had made love. Oh, of course, Anya pointed out to herself, I know Retchell did it because the president ordered her to. But at least it didn't seem like she hated it. And for Anya, it had been purely wonderful.

When I have my dreams, she thought, about me and Retchell, I just need to remind myself that I did get that much for real. And I get to sleep with her every night here. How many people even come that close to their dreams coming true?

The gloom pushed back once more. It sounded like there would be another woman here soon. That one Retchell had spent the night tied up with, the big, really strong woman who had once hit Anya in a fight. Now Anya knew her name: Irina Novocheva. It sounded vaguely familiar. Something to do with sports. Anya never paid much attention to sports. Anya hadn't liked Irina at all -- she was the only woman in the prison who looked like she liked to hit people. Another insight the general had just confirmed.

Well, thought Anya, she won't be able to hit me here. She won't be able to do anything at all. But -- and here is where Anya's gloom focused -- Anya didn't want this Novocheva woman to get to spend time with Retchell, with Anya left out. And especially Anya didn't want the sleeping arrangements disturbed in any way. That was her greatest fear.

*   *   *   *   *

Zlata had thought it out. She couldn't tell the others what she'd seen, not even writing it on paper so that listeners couldn't overhear. She couldn't get them involved in what she was going to do. If she were caught, then only she would be sent to prison. The others would be safe.

She did need a little minor help, if only for the opportunity to give an out-loud plausible rationalization, to anyone listening, for the first step of her plan.

She went into Veronika's room, where Veronika was watching a game show on television. "I've been thinking, there's no harm in giving the girls a little privacy. Like for any other hospital patients."

Veronika's brow wrinkled. "Privacy? How?"

"I mean we can rig up some curtains around them. Wouldn't you expect that, if you were them?"

Veronika gave her an uncertain look. The girls were the president's prisoners, and the nurses weren't supposed to mess with them.

At last her professionalism won out. She did feel very badly for Blondie and Pixie, and she had made a promise to try to make their lives better. And this seemed harmless. If anyone really was monitoring the cameras all around, surely they had no real reason to watch two patients who couldn't move anyway. She stood up. "Okay. How?"

Zlata had assessed the inventory in the ward already, and had a ready answer. There were several extra IV stands, there were the plastic tubes to serve as curtain rods connecting them at the top in a rectangle around the girls' bed -- the ropes could be used for that, except Larisa might need them again at any time -- and there were extra bedsheets in the drawers in the nurses' rooms. Like children building a fort, Zlata and Veronika soon assembled a curtained enclosure around the bed where the "patients" slept. Raisa came out of her room, curious, but by that time they were too nearly finished to need her help.

*   *   *   *   *

"Sir?" Corporal Tilachev signaled to the captain from the video monitor.

Captain Bolgarin walked over. "What is it, corporal... Oh." He frowned at the monitor. "What is that?"

"It suddenly showed up when I fast-forwarded through the latest video. Two of them erected it around the bed. I replayed it with sound to see what was going on." He played the video/audio of the two nurses.

Bolgarin scratched his chin. Nurses arranging for patient privacy sounded reasonable enough, but the important question was of security. "We don't have a camera that can look inside that."

"No, sir. Should I arrange for installing one in the ceiling?"

Bolgarin thought a moment, and shook his head. "Not for the present. Preston and Simonina aren't exactly capable of hatching any sort of plot from inside there." He smiled at the idea of the mannequins coming to life to that extent, and continued scratching his chin. "Let's see how the nurses use it. Most likely it's for exactly what they said. I'll leave orders for the surveillance team that if the nurses all start congregating in there for any length of time, I'll want enhanced audio of the meeting. We can figure out what's going on from that."

"Yes, sir."



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