Linda felt thwarted. “I didn’t mean…”
“I know what you meant, pussy,” Ashwin said, getting up from behind the cargo trunk and moving to stand next to Linda, “and you know what I want. I suggest you get down on your knees. Irene could use a good tongue lashing.”
Linda contemplated Irene’s upturned bottom. She would have to comply with Ashwin’s wishes, and, while potentially uncomfortable with the idea, it was for Irene and Linda knew, if the tables were turned, Irene would be the first to drop to her knees. For her.
She turned her eyes toward Ashwin’s camera. “And you’re going to photography me doing it?”
“For prosperity,” he snickered.
Linda fought the dread and taking a steadying breath, she nodded wordlessly and got down level with the suffering flesh.
“No. Don’t.” Irene tried to struggle up but one of the trainers planted a hand flat in the middle of her back. “Linda, don’t.”
But Linda was already separating the veils of Irene’s sex and as she ran the tip of her tongue along the moist divide, Ashwin’s camera was rattling off in her ear.
“The last strokes are mine,” Ashwin announced excitedly, once Linda had wiped her mouth and pushed to her feet.
Irene’s behind felt burned and raw and she wondered how much more she could endure. She wrapped her arms around the ends of the trunk and mentally prepared, telling herself there was no shame in crying out. Anything that would help her bear the pain would be okay.
“Get her up,”Ashwin said.
The words ricocheted inside Irene’s skull. She was being allowed to stand? Was it over?
“C’mon, help her…”
The trainers got an arm each and pulled Irene to her feet. She stood in front of him, trembling like an aspen, her jeans still about her knees.
Ashwin chilled her. “Take off your shirt.”
“Oh no.”
“Shit. Someone get her fucking shirt off.” Ashwin screamed.
One of the trainers reached for her collar and ripped down. Buttons flew and he tore the fabric from her shoulders.
“That’s better,”Ashwin looked at her naked breasts. “Nice tits. Big, but not sloppy. Yes, very nice. Hold the left one up for me.”
Irene’s senses were spinning. She was frantic, completely hyped. What did he want of her?
“Are you deaf? Or just fuckin’ stupid. Hold your left tit up,” Ashwin yelled, his voice touched with insanity.
“Okay– okay,” Irene conceded and placing her breast it the palms of her hands, she lifted it out to him.
“Beautiful,” he said. And before she could react, he hit her.
The white hot jolt arched from her breast to her underarm, bolted across her collarbone and flooded her chest with burn. He had swung the paddle up over his head and down, the tip of the blade slashing the nipple.
Irene fell back, nausea rising in her throat. “Oh Jesus– oh Jesus,” she huffed between clenched teeth. Her first thought was to look down to see if the nipple had been torn from the mound. The trainers got to her before she could sink to the sanctuary of the ground and forced her back to Ashwin.
“Lift your breast to me, dear. Three strokes on each. I never said I was going to spank you on your ass.”
Irene tried to turn away but the trainers held her by the arms. “No please. It’s too much. You can’t.”
“It’s better than being executed, isn’t it? I could do that. Think of it: I could open your guts, choke you to death on your own entrails. I could hang you on the stake and roast you alive. Or perhaps you prefer water-sports. How do you feel about being bound, hand and foot, and staked out in the river. Be interesting to find out how long you can float on your back; don’t you think? Now come here and hold up your left tit for punishment.”
Irene sobbed. Her whole world was falling from its axis. Was death preferable to this? A quick death? Any escape? Irene shook her head in agony, breathed deeply then shook herself free of the hands that held her. She took a step toward him and offer up her breast on crossed palms.
Ashwin swung the paddle up over his head and brought it down again like an ax. He clipped the proffered flesh across the pointy face and Irene stumbled back again into the arms of the trainers.
She had never known such despair. A dark hopelessness entwined her heart as she was pushed forward once again. She watched Ashwin lift the paddle above his head. She stood helpless before him, supporting the underside of her breast and waiting for the hurt. When he tensed, she could only close her eyes and turn her face away, her insides were coiled as tight as wire.
There was the sound of the air moving across the blade. The sickening smack and, at first, the searing sting, followed by a raging burn that exploded across her ribs; like the meat of her breast had been shredded by a saw-blade.
Irene sagged on unresponsive knees. The trainers held her. Ashwin sneered in her ear: “C’mon bitch. Again. Hold your fuckin’ tit up.”
He hit her three more times and, forcing back the creeping darkness, Irene was led back to the cargo trunk. “Spread her across it,” she heard Ashwin say.
Irene felt her spirits lift. Having her ass beaten was certainly preferable to taking more blows across her breasts. But Ashwin said: “No. turn her. Face up.” And she realized with chilling revulsion; her vagina was not to be spared.
Irene ended up on her back and had her legs lifted. Under Ashwin’s instruction, each trainer took an ankle, rocking Irene back on her shoulder blades, her knees each side of her face.
“Now spread her. I want to see her cunt gaping,” he said, eyeing the lips of her vagina. “Okay. You other men, bring the girls over.”
The girls, all sixteen, were shepherded into a line and led past Irene’s opened legs. Each girl was forced to pause and look while Ashwin prodded the more delectable bottoms with his paddle. Irene, demoralized, could only turn her head in shame.
Once everyone had seen, Ashwin stepped into place and delivered the next blow. The paddle came down squarely on Irene’s pubis. A shaft of pain registered on Irene’s face, her jaw tightened and she sucked air.
Ashwin paused to roll his neck, stretching the knotting muscles and to give Irene a moment to contemplate the final blows. He had the men stretch her legs wider, took careful aim and with all his remaining strength, brought the paddle down on the softer flesh, low down.
Irene shrieked. A long keening cry of anguish and disbelief. Neutrons snapped, crackling like heat lightening along the backs of her thighs and the jolt rocketed up her spinal cord. Bright flashes danced behind clenched eyelids. Not allowing her time to recover, Ashwin hit her again, this time with the handle. A bruising jab thrust into the cavity. A second taser-like jolt lifted her, crippling her arched spine.
The trainers released her ankles and fearing another assault between the legs, Irene rolled to the side. She landed with a numbing jar on the pine-needles, came up on her knees and, leaning forward, she vomited up the meager contents of her stomach. She was roughly hauled back to her feet and her wrists bound in wire. Half dragging, half carrying, the men hauled Irene to the stake. She was forced up onto a wooden crate with her back to the pole. One of the men got up with her and looped her wrists over the top and notched the wire on the stubby branch. With a cruel snicker he stepped down and kicked the crate out from under Irene’s bare feet. She dropped.
They left her, dangling, her feet unable to reach the ground. Her shoulder joints were wrenched and the extended muscles in her chest brought the fire back into her breasts. She watched the men surround her girls and prodding with their billy-clubs, pushing and shoving, they herded her flight-crew closer so they could examine Ashwin’s handy-work.
And then the men turned on the girls. It was the gang rape that haunts a woman’s nightmares and that a man craves in his heart of darkness.
Melissa and Linda were the first to go down. The men tore their bathing suits from their bodies and knocked the legs out from under them. Irene battled to stay conscious and in her watery mind, she thought it odd that Melissa and Linda would be the first. Both were beautiful girls, yes, but so different. Melissa’s beauty was brutally honest, blatant in its presentation while Linda’s beauty was subtle; an internal beauty that eked out through the slope of her crooked smile, was there in the way she could make you feel transparent with liquid brown eyes, catch your breath with a raised eyebrow. Throw her head back and, unrestrained, laugh right out loud. And yet, naked and flat on their backs, with men pumping obscenely between their legs, the white soles of their feet kicking in the air, Irene couldn’t tell one girl from the other. A brutal fucking leveled the playing field; was the degrading common denominator.
The rest of her girls scattered but in their high-heels they were quickly overtaken. Hanging in her restraints, Irene watched the men chase down her flight-crew, flinging the struggling girls to the ground. Bikini bottoms were being tossed back and forth, the men whipping the colorful scraps of fabric at each other like snowballs.
Whooping and hollering like a tribe of matinée Indians, the men dashed from girl to girl, dropping down between splayed legs, thrusting repeatedly, several times, before moving on to sample the depth and tightness of the next girl.
Disheartened and feeling hopelessly lost, Irene watched Pamela go down, her bikini top tangled about her waist. A man fell on her, his hand disappearing between their bodies. Pamela stiffened, screamed, and pounding with tiny balled fists, her knees came up. She struggled with the man thrashing between her legs, but to no avail and finally, throwing a forearm across her face, she surrendered her body to him. After he was done with her, he rolled off and left her for the next man.
Irene closed her eyes and mercifully, the world went away.