Death and the Russian Winter

The Kitchens, Corporation Safe House, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:15PM

“Owww,” Gregor moaned as Valeri dabbed the iodine on the boy’s badly bruised and cut face. The kid’s nose was broken, there could be no doubt of that and Valeri didn't like the size of some of the bruises on his lower abdomen.

The Corporation snatch squad was sitting in the kitchen of the safe house licking their wounds. Although all the conspirators had suffered at Leona’s hand it seemed that Anton was in the worse condition, his trip down the stairs had broken one arm and damaged one of his legs. Valeri himself had lost two teeth and suspected a cracked rib. The pain from his jaw and his punished crotch still troubled him.

“ I think we should whip the little bitch,” Anton moaned clutching his arm, “no matter whose daughter she is?”

“Would you like to explain that to Invictor?” Valeri asked, raising a questioning eyebrow. “Invictor” was Conrad Graaf’s Corporation code name.

Anton went white, looked down and fidgeted a little. Nobody in the organization crossed Invictor and lived, sullenly he mumbled his displeasure under his breath.

“Besides which you can’t really punished the girl for this debacle when it was clearly your fault,” announced a voice with a crisp, upper class English accent. The men turned towards the speaker who was sitting at the kitchen table playing patience. The man was in his mid thirties with dark, slicked down hair and a thin moustache. He was also impeccably dressed in a stylish pinstripe Saville Row suit, linen shirt and a silk school tie. The Englishman had not been part of the group that had raced upstairs to investigate Anton’s sudden fall from grace, in fact the rest of the men would have preferred it if he wasn’t there at all.

They all stiffened and mumbled at the Englishman’s comments but it was Valeri who took up the challenge. “And how do you think that your lordship?” he asked.

“Viscount,” the Englishman corrected, “at least until father dies.” He placed another card on one of the lines of patience he was building and looked up from the table. “Leona’s actions is exactly what I would have expected from Invictor’s daughter,” he said smugly, “you gave her an opportunity and she took it.” He looked the battered men up and down, gave a small patronizing smile and shook his head. “Face it gentlemen,” he said, “Give someone like that the opportunity to misbehave and they will use it to punish you mercilessly. She should never have been given that chance, you had the advantage of surprise and of numbers, your inability to handle one little girl shows an appalling lack of tradecraft. Knowing who her father is you should have been extra careful with Leona, she seems extremely spirited and totally ruthless just like her father. I have no doubt that if Leona had reached that gun she would have dispatched you all without flinching.”

He settled back in his chair and smiled. “Breeding you see gentlemen,” he said as he laid the last card on the line, “superior genetics. It’s been the passing of strong family characteristics through the generations that has made us what we are today. The Corporation would not have lasted as long or been as powerful without the key families, the dynasties of slavers that give us continuity.”

Behind him someone snorted

Toby Mountbuffington paused. It was bad enough that he had to come to this communist hellhole but he wasn’t about to put up with back chat from the lower orders. It was time to remind these men just who it was they were dealing with. “In any case that will be in my report,” he said smiling.

Valeri scowled. The last thing anyone wanted was for this incident to be reported. Unfortunately this was the most important Corporation operation in recent years and the Board had insisted on sending an observer. Valeri looked the Englishman over with distaste. It rankled him that the man was here at all, and yet he was obviously very important since the crew was not even allowed to know the man’s code name.

“Actually,” the Englishman mused, “I wouldn’t mind giving the filly a good look over myself before we leave. I have a cousin looking for a bride at the moment. Good little Corporate breeding bitch with a bit of spunk might be right up his alley. To be honest that branch of the family could use some new blood.”

“If Invictor says yes,” Valeri said sullenly. Valeri worked for Graaf and knew that the German despised the English aristocrats that still ruled the Corporation.

“Of course he will,” Viscount Mountbuffington said dismissively, “how often do you think a Bavarian tradesman gets the chance to wed one of his welps into European royalty? He’ll jump at the chance. Good God man, his grandson would be a Duke, hell he could even become Chairman of the Corporation one day!”

Valeri snorted and chose to ignore the Englishman’s ranting. Valeri was one of Graaf’s most trusted men, his spy inside Peter’s crew. He knew of his bosses little schemes, how Graaf was strengthening his grip on the continental arm of the Corporation. Soon he would be ready and the English nobles who ran the Corporation would be swept away in a coup as fast and as bloody as the revolution. Consoling himself with that thought for the moment Valeri tended instead to Gregor.

“You have a concussion,” he said kindly to his stunned nephew, “do you think you can make it home?”

Gregor nodded, still dazed and more than a little confused. The boys front teeth where missing, his jaw probably fractured too, it was hard to talk but he managed. “Yes uncle,” Gregor croaked.

“Then leave now while there is time,” he told his nephew, “tell your mother you slipped down some steps in the snow. Have her take you to a doctor tomorrow, understand?”

The boy nodded and stood, trembling while he started to dress in his thick winter clothes.

Valeri checked the boy one last time. “Good,” he said, “there are two guards in the alleyway outside.” He thrust a crumpled piece of paper into the boy’s hand. “Give them this note, one of them will take you to the main street and stay with you until you get a bus or a cab, understand?” The boy nodded and Valeri took him to the door. The boy seemed nervous like a frightened animal. Valeri doubted that he would ever be much good as a slaver now, the boy’s brief encounter with Leona had ruined him for good. Under his breath the Russian gave a little curse of vengeance. Conrad Graaf or no Conrad Graaf Valeri would have his revenge on the girl; his family honor demanded it. Silently he waited in the open doorway as the boy staggered the short distance to the alleyway. A moment later he watched the boy and one of the soldiers trudged down the road towards the main street....

.... where something dark and monstrous was waiting patiently.

Intercontinental Hotel, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:15PM

"Lick faster," Alison ordered.

Olga couldn’t hear her in the conventional sense. The black symbiont still covered most of her head including her eyes and ears. When Alison gave the helpless girl an order she did it though her new implant and the symbiont translated her orders into sound for her new captive. 

It hadn’t taken Olga long to discover the price of disobedience, when ordered to lick faster she did what she was told. Olga's tongue lapped at Sophia's naked clit causing the captive maid to bite down on her gag and moan. For Sophie the nightmare that had started when Miss Leona attacked her was continuing though now it was Miss Allison who was Sophia's tormentor. The English maid didn't know what had happened to the two friends that had caused them to think that teasing Sophia's pussy was the ultimate sport.

Sophie arched her back and bit down on her gag as Olga's skillful tongue explored her sex. The helpless maid arched her back pulling on the ropes that held her helpless while the equally helpless Russian girl lapped at Sophie’s exposed sex. Changing her position Olga licked and teased Sophia's naked thigh.

Sophie whimpered helplessly. She had been a good girl, she had saved herself for marriage as her mother had wanted, but such teasing and sexual need was beyond the young virgin's ability to resist. As Olga's tongue continued to probe Sophie found herself welcoming it's teasing touch, she trust her sex up to meet her tormentor, her gag muffling her begging cries for relief.

“My, my Sophie,” Alison cooed as she reached down to stroke Sophia’s damp thighs, “such a needy little girl. Why I do believe you would sell your soul to the devil for an orgasm right now?”

Tired, horny and broken a tearful Sophie nodded.

Alison smiled darkly. “Good my little slave, because that’s exactly the kind of deal we have in mind,” she said.

Drawing Room, Corporation Safe House, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:30PM

Valeri checked his reflection in the mirror again. He had attempted to hide the bruising on his face with a little powder but with little success. It still looked like he had been involved in quite a fight and that was hardly the image he was trying to achieve. Wincing he tried again, managing to cover the worse of the bruising. He sighed deeply, it would have to do. He paused to brush a little lint from the shoulders of his dark suit. The suit belonged.... *had belonged* to Peter and the young German had personally picked it out for Valeri once it had been decided that the rat faced Russian would play the part of Peter's butler.

Peter was expecting the suit back, but then he was also expecting to come out of this mission alive and if Valeri had anything to do with it Peter was going to be wrong on both counts. Valeri adjusted his collar. In truth Valeri *liked* Peter he was a good Captain willing to listen to the needs of his men. He was efficient too and under the young German's spirited leadership the Corporation's Eastern European operation had been very profitable for all concerned. It seemed terrible that such a talented young slaver had to be sacrificed because of stupid internal politics. Valeri sighed again and adjusted his tie.

The trouble with Peter was that he had been far too successful. When he had first been sent to Moscow nobody had really expected him to succeed. In fact Conrad Graaf had been so confident that the Russian mission would be a disaster that he had let his arch rival Max run the operation. Graaf had been sure that the project's failure would destroy Max's influence in the Corporation and eliminate him as a threat to Graaf’s authority.

However, against all odds Peter had made his little crew one of the most successful in the Corporation. Within months of coming to Moscow Peter has secured his place in Corporate history when he had managed to steal the Russian princess Anastasia out from under the noses of her Bolshevik guards. The Corporation had been proud of his success, the White Russian's had been trying for months to free one of the royal family to act as a figurehead for their uprising. Now the World's oldest white slavery organization had shown them just how it should be done. Very few agents in the history of the organization had had the opportunity to collect a royal and the girl was a pretty, blue eyed, nineteen year old virgin to boot.

Max hadn’t been slow to capitalize on the success of his protégé, using Peter to boost his own standing with the Board. Desperate to gain some of the glory Graaf had insisted that his men transport Anastasia to her new owner, a debauched Russian exile living in Paris

However Anastasia had other ideas. In Berlin she had managed to slip her bonds and escape Graaf’s men. Pursued by a Corporation snatch squad she had desperately thrown herself into the river.

Sometime later she had reappeared with a group of Czarist sympathizers in Berlin. Her protectors where far too prominent to be bought off and they ensured she was too well guarded for the Corporation to move against her. Graaf was paying dearly for his men’s mistake. The full cost of the Corporation’s smear campaign against Anastasia, one that claimed she was an imposter, was being paid for out of Graaf’s personal fortune.

Now, faced with the prospect that Peter and Max could pull off the abduction of the century Graaf had been forced to act. If the crew managed to secure Alison then it was up to Valeri to ensure that Peter never survived to receive the glory and that the girl was delivered to Graaf’s men for transport.

Valeri looked in the mirror again and made a final adjustment to the tie. Poor Peter was going to freeze to death, an unfortunate accident during the “robbery.” Once Alison was on her way Valeri would move Leona to the warm kitchen where a large fire would see her through the night. Peter however would be left in the cold bedroom and would certainly be dead by morning.

For a moment Valeri considered leaving Leona with Peter. Regretfully he dismissed the idea. The girl would pay for her attack on Gregor but Valeri was not stupid enough to kill her. However, the thought of the bitch freezing to death helped to burn off some of his anger.

Suddenly another thought came to him. He wondered how Marie was faring in the cellar? He checked his pocket watch. The runaway slave should have frozen to death by now. Perhaps he would go and check on her? If she was ready they could load her corpse onto the truck with Alison and dump the body by the side of the road on the way to the station. That way they wouldn’t need to bring the noisy truck back to the house again. He checked the watch again as he headed towards the stairs. He had the time, he may as well use it, besides it would keep him away from his lordship and his pompous pronouncements. Feeling a little better, Valeri headed downstairs.

Outside the Corporation Safe House, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:31PM

If anything it was even worse outside than Karl could imagine, a strong wind that brought both snow and freezing temperatures with it. Somehow it found it's way through his many layers of clothes chilling him to the bone. Karl had been born in the Alps and thought he had some experience of the cold. However nothing had prepared him for this. Grunting as he took each step, he made his was laboriously towards the alleyway that linked the yard at the back of the house with the road.

It wasn't a great distance but still he found himself taking a rest every few meters. He had been wrong about the weather, there was no way the men could hope to carry the coffin through this. He would check with his lookouts and then talk to Valeri, perhaps he could still abort the operation before it was too late.

He had posted two lookouts in the small alleyway that linked the yard to the road. Because there was no direct line of sight between the house and the stables, one of the men had the job of watching the road while the other watched the back entrance of the house. This second man acted as a relay, passing on messages from the house to the stables about the progress of the abduction.

Karl trudged across the courtyard towards the first of his lookouts. Andreas was one of his most trusted men, a fellow Bavarian with a taste for the good life and the fine things the sale of compliant female flesh could buy. He was a hard worker and Karl had not been surprised when the man had taken the roughest part of the assignment. As he got closer he could see Andreas leaning hunched up against the wall of the alley. Karl called to him, but the arctic wind snatched his words away immediately. The big Bavarian grinned to himself. Andreas was leaning against the wall and facing the wrong way, probably talking to his comrade further down the alley. The strong wind would hide Karl’s approach. Perhaps it was time to see just how vigilant his friend really was? Laughing he crept up and slapped a heavy hand on the man's shoulder. "Polis," he growled.

There was a moment's pause, then a loud crack and Andreas' body fell heavily to the floor. For a moment Karl stood looking down at the frozen body of his comrade, unbelieving eyes looking over dead man's features, at the look of blind terror that remained frozen to his face. Then Karl forced himself to look down towards his friend's chest where the gray of his old army greatcoat had been stained brown by frozen blood. Here the ribs had been caved in, Karl could see the red-brown cavity in the man's chest that was slowly filling with the wind driven snow. He got an impression of shattered bone and torn flesh before he was forced to turn away and be sick.

Whoever had killed him had also taken his heart.....

Karl finished heaving and tried to pull himself together.  He had seen worse in the trenches, but that had been a while ago and to some extent he had managed to put those terrible times behind him. Shivering he reached down, trembling hand moving on automatic, and tried to close Andreas' wide, sightless, terror filled eyes. To his horror Karl found that the cold had already frozen them, Andreas’s tears where now transparent windows of ice that prevented the eyelids from moving. Karl looked around but found only a blanket of freshly fallen snow. He frowned and looked again. These men had been out here for only a few minutes and despite the snow their own footprints and those of the men they had been sent to replace were clearly visible. Karl shivered but not with the cold. There were no marks made by the mysterious assailant. Karl shivered again. Out here, alone in the snow blanketed silence some primeval terror gripped him.

It took all of Karl’s courage to walk the short distance through the dark alleyway to the street. There was no sign of the second guard and still no sign of the mysterious assailant who has butchered Andreas. Every nerve, every instinct screamed for the big Bavarian to run but duty to the dead man and to their mission caused him to turn back towards the alley where the frozen corpse lay waiting. Bowed down and fighting the ice cold wind Karl trudged back to Andreas, falling to his knees he started to shovel snow with his hands, covering the corpse and hiding it as best he could.

Karl scrambled to his feet. Blowing on his frozen fingers he checked his work. The pile of snow he had made still looked too much like a hastily buried body for his liking but hopefully fresh snow would soon cover that. Satisfied that this was the best he could do Karl gathered his courage and hurried back towards the little cluster of out buildings where the rest of his team were waiting.

---------------

The Cellars, Corporation Safe House, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:34PM

Valeri held the lantern above his head and started carefully down the cellar stairs. It was cold in the cellar, bitterly cold, Valeri paused and looked back up the stairs wondering if he should return for his coat. In the end he decided that he didn't need to bother, it would only take him a moment to check on Marie.

He paused outside the cellar door and an odd nervousness gripped him. Over the years he had killed a lot of people, more than he could count, but he had known very few of them personally. Tonight he would kill Marie and Peter, two people he had known for years and that made him uneasy for some reason. Valeri shook his head and tried to calm his nerves Then, wrapping his hand in his suit jacket to protect it from the cold metal, he drew back the big iron bolts and opened the cellar door.

The oil on the hinges had frozen and instead of opening smoothly the door made a horrible groaning sound. Startled and suddenly uneasy it took all of Valeri's courage to step inside. The light from his lantern cast strange and frightening shadows on the peeling whitewash walls as the man crept over to the still figure tied to the chair. Marie's head was bowed and resting on her chest, the thick gag still filling her mouth. As Valeri got closer her could see a thin, cobweb like silver fuzz that seemed to cover every part of her naked body. The man frowned, the thin filaments seemed to sparkle in the light of his lantern almost like it was a thin layer of frost that had formed on her body. Puzzled, Valeri put the lantern down and moved in closer. The silver fuzz covered the girl's whole body even her closed eyelids. Perhaps the sweat from her struggles had frozen on her body after it had cooled? Hand trembling, he reached out and stroked her ruined breast, his hand touching the thin silver threads.

To his surprise he found her skin warm to the touch.

Marie's eyes snapped open. There was a look in them that Valeri had never seen before, an intense, almost insane hatred. The man gasped and took a step back just as the girl's hand flashed around and buried a knife in the side of his neck.

Valeri gasped and staggered back colliding with the wall. Slowly the silver figure rose from the chair, the cut bonds falling easily from her body. As the singing started in Valeri’s ears she strode towards him, her silver coated naked body giving her an ethereal quality; like an art deco angel of death. Reaching up she tore the protective aerogel from her face and pulled the hated gag from her mouth. Valeri slumped to the floor, his lifeblood ebbing away.

Marie stood over him, her eyes full of a dark hatred. Her timidness and insecurity was gone, she had faced death and returned, there was nothing left to fear.

"Bonjour Valeri," she said, turning her head to one side as she watched the dying man. “This is quite a reversal ne pas? Only a few hours ago it was you down here watching me die.” She squatted down and looked into his eyes. “I just wanted you to know that I am better than you, that you are a monster while I am a human being. You left me to die alone and cold in the darkness, where I have the compassion to send you quickly to hell.”

Grabbing his head with one hand she drove the knife deeply into his heart with the other, watching dispassionately as the light left his eyes. She pulled the bloody knife from Valeri’s rapidly cooling corpse and wiped it on Peter’s jacket. “Tell them to make room in hell,” she whispered as the death rattle escaped his ruined throat, she looked up towards the cellar stairs. “You will be having company soon.”

Central Station, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:34PM

Dimitri Casparov, second shift Stationmaster of Moscow's central station, representative of the railway worker's peoples committee (western region), stood on a baggage trolley and looked at the small cluster of railway workers.

This would never do! He shook his head in horror, eyes scanning the faces. It took a minimum of forty people to run the station and only sixteen had shown up due to the weather.

“Is this all?” he Dimitri asked.

“There are two more in the signal box,” Old Oskar the cleaner wheezed, “they were too busy to come.”

The signal box ran the whole district, usually it took ten men to operate it. Dimitri shivered to think of what could happen if those two tired men lost track of the trains. The same thought seemed to have come to the others, the little worried group started to chatter amongst themselves.

"Comrades!" Dimitri called. Getting no answer he shouted louder. "Comrades, your attention please!"

They looked up. Dimitri took off his cap and smoothed his thin, gray hair.

“Comrades there is more,” he said looking from face to face, “_HE_ is coming here tonight.” Dimitri swallowed nervously,  “He has demanded a special train.”

There was a moment’s silence. He could have been any number of people from Stalin to Molotov but instinctively the railway workers knew who Dimitri was talking about. One of the women crossed herself, then noticing that the others were watching she hastily converted the gesture into a tidying of her shawl. Here in Moscow the only man everyone feared was Commissar Aleksei Rostov, the head of the secret police.

It was old Oskar that spoke first. “Where would the Comrade Commissar wish to go?” he asked, fear and curiosity fighting for possession of his toothless, wrinkled face.

“That is none of your concern,” Dimitri said curtly, “just be aware that even short manned we must show the Commissar that we are good Communists, willing and able to work hard for the people!”

Dimitri hoped that he had sounded suitably devout and that his earnest acceptance of the party line would be reported by the informants in the group.

Quickly he handed out the tasks to his people, making sure that despite the weather nothing would interfere with the Commissar’s plans. The problem was that he was still undermanned. If he didn’t get extra help soon..... Well it was best not to think of that. He had done his rounds earlier and noticed a few people lurking at the end of platform twenty two. Perhaps they could be persuaded to help him out in this crisis?

Dimitri checked his watch again. He had time, it would do no harm to see what extra help he could find. Smoothing his hair again, the Stationmaster headed towards his office.

Outside the Corporation Safe House, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:40PM

Karl reached the carriage house first. It was here where the Corporation team had stored the truck along with the two men whose job it was to keep the engine and the diesel fuel from freezing.

As Karl paused outside he could see the patch of discolored snow and the red flow of  fresh blood that was seeping under the door. Trembling, he opened the side door and looked inside.

He gasped and staggered back, shock and horror competing with the feeling that he had seen something like this before, back in the trenches. During a push one of his comrades had climbed out of a trench and been hit full on by a French mortar. The man had been totally destroyed in the explosion, a few shards of bone and a thin film of splattered blood all that had been left of him. Now a similar scene greeted Karl’s wide unbelieving eyes. He could see two bodies, or to be more accurate two piles of ribs on the floor. Everything else in the room from the truck to the roof beams was painted red-brown by a film of thick sticky blood.

Karl stepped back almost slipping on the blood-ice outside. Desperate now he staggered the short distance to the stable and stepped inside.

One of the two men dressed in army uniforms stood in front of him. Karl opened his mouth to cry out a warning when the man’s odd stance and glazed eyes caused Karl to freeze in horror. The cry of alarm died in his throat, it was far, far too late for that. The soldier was squatting in an odd position in front of the brassier, his legs widely spread apart, his body leaning back. There was a red mark on his brown uniform coat at stomach level. As Karl tried to make sense of what he was seeing a sudden burst of wind blew through the open door disturbing the figure’s delicate equilibrium and causing it to topple to one side. Now Karl could see that the man’s rifle had been trust into his back, impaling him, the gun had then been used as a crude stand to prop up the dead body.

Behind him on the floor lay the body of the second soldier, intact except that the head had been reduced to a burnt and grinning skull. Over at the back of the stable the coffin had been stood on it’s end, the balding effigy facing a badly burned corpse across a chessboard. The body of the second chess player had been folded back and broken, leg and arm bones thrust into the earth floor so that the corpse could be used as a makeshift table to hold the chessboard.

However, the real horror had been reserved for the card table. Olav’s headless and handless body lay slumped in its chair. On the table rested Olav’s served head, its sightless eyes peering at a spread of cards held in one his dismembered hands that was also resting on the table. Across from the head one of the other player’s sat, his throat torn out, his hands laid out open on the table as if he was showing a hand of cards. However the hand he held in his cold dead fingers was Olav’s second served hand. For a moment Karl didn’t see the third player but as his horrified mind took in the carefully arranged tableau he finally noticed the missing man. The object on the chair seemed to be a cube a foot and a half square into which the body of a man had been bent and crushed first one way and then the other. The effect was similar to the way a laundry would fold and press a long blanket to fit it into the smallest space. In fact where it not for the blood and occasional body part, the object looked like a pile of folded clothes....

....folded. Karl’s mind overloaded with horror, as the macabre joke suddenly became clear. The man with the gashed throat was showing his hand, Olav was still holding his, which meant that the broken body on the chair had folded.....

And then the corpse at the table reached forward for its winnings.

Screaming, his sanity almost gone, Karl turned and ran outside, where a dark figure waited patiently.

Karl screeched to a halt. The man standing before him was dressed completely in black, from the boots on his feet to the black leather hood that covered his face. The only hint of color was the tiny golden lines that radiated from the man’s dark pupils. The man’s cloak was blowing in the wind, and yet the snow didn’t fall on him, almost like it was too scared to get close.

The being nodded. “You must be Karl,” it said satisfied as if it were crossing him off some mental list. The voice was cold and seemed to drip liquid darkness.

Trembling, the big Bavarian, half-mad with horror, turned and ran for the alley. He had struggled a few meters when he looked up..... and found the dark figure standing impassively before him. Still screaming Karl turned towards the house and the protection of his other comrades. He had staggered a few meters towards the back door when the masked man stepped out of the shadows before him. Sobbing, his sanity hanging by a thread, Karl sank to his knees in the snow. “Make it quick,” he cried, “I beg you.” Karl still had his revolver but he realized it would do him no good, the creature before him was about to swat him like an insect.

And then it laughed.

“I won’t kill you,” the figure said flatly.

The words soaked into the man’s terror filled mind. “I...I’m going to live?” Karl stammered.

“For a while,” the creature agreed.

Karl tensed.

The dark man laughed and his next words had a hint of amusement. “For your natural human life span,” he clarified, “nobody lives forever Comrade. In fact the Russians have a saying that only two things in life are inevitable, death and the Russian winter. You are lucky, someone cares for you enough to have begged for your miserable life.”

Karl blinked and looked up. Snow fell on his upturned face as he looked at the dark figure. “Y....you’ll let me go?” he asked, quivering like a leaf, then the meaning of what the being had just said came home to him. “Someone begged for me?”

“Yes.”

“Who?” Karl asked, puzzled.

The creature laughed. “Surely you must know?”

Karl shook his head, of all the people he had know in the past few years he could think of no one that would face this monster and beg for Karl’s life.

Eventually, the dark figure lost patience. “She calls herself Marie,” it said at last, “she begged me to spare your life and I granted her request.”

Karl started crying. Marie had saved him. The girl he hadn’t had the courage to rescue, the one he had delivered to a certain death had faced this horror and pleaded for Karl’s life. Karl sobbed, “I didn’t even realize that she liked me so much..... I was blind, please forgive me, Marie...... please.”

The dark being laughed again. “She has forgiven you,” it said, “but you won’t find me so understanding. I promised her that I would let you live, however the crimes you committed cannot go unavenged. Understand that the moral codes of your people mean nothing to me and what you consider to be good or evil is of no importance in the wider context. I have done things that your people would consider monstrous, but I remain true to myself. What I do is for the greater good as I judge it but what you and the others do serves no purpose but your own selfish gratification. Your attitude..... pains me.” It paused. “Now you must pay for that. I will not kill you but I can ensure that for once you weep true tears for your victims.”

With a flurry of it’s cloak the figure turned and strode back towards the house. At that moment the pain tore at Karl’s consciousness. Screaming against the wind he brought his hands up to his face. Howling he felt the hot liquid that ran though his fingers and smelt the odor of rendered fat. As unconsciousness claimed him he realized that the warm substance that ran down his cheeks to drip on the snow were not his tears but the fatty remains of his own melted eyes.

Master Bedroom, Corporation Safe House, Moscow

Tuesday January 1st 1929  9:40PM

Gerber allowed himself a long, hungry look down Leona's half naked body. They had lashed her booted ankles to the legs of the chair, forcing her legs open and revealing her shaved and naked pussy. Further up the corset enhanced her already stunning figure making her look sexy and feminine. Above that where the two wonderful milky orbs of her breasts, her nipples pink and erect, even her flushed face and disheveled hair was sexy, giving the girl the damsel in distress look that Gerber found so appealing. He wished that he could speak to her, perhaps taunt her a little? She looked especially cute when her eyes flared and she muttered insults into her gag. However, the cover story Peter had concocted had to be maintained. Gerber would play his part as a desperate Russian peasant forced into a life of crime, a man with no knowledge of German.

Gerber settled back in his chair and watched silently as the bound and gagged girl moaned and struggled. It was a great pity she was the big boss's daughter Gerber decided, any other girl he could have toyed with to his heart's content.  Still, even if he couldn't fuck her there were other ways he could amuse himself. Reaching forward he started to play with her naked tits, running his hands over the soft curves of her breasts and tweaking her small pink nipples. Leona moaned and snorted her indignation, struggling even harder against the ropes that bound her to the chair. From behind Gerber could hear Peter thrashing on the bed. Stifled, gagged sounds of outrage showing that the man was far from happy. Gerber wondered if Peter was really upset or if this was part of his act? Not that it mattered of course, from tonight Peter's opinion was no longer important.

Grinning behind his mask Gerber started to roll Leona's nipples between his thumb and forefinger, amused by the way her indignant growls became soft panting moans of lust. More stroking followed, then Gerber reached over and twisted a nipple, watching with amusement as the girl squirmed in pain. That would teach the little bitch to fight, he decided, right now he really wished he had permission to fuck her. Lost in daydreams of rape and retribution Gerber played a hand up her naked thigh.

Over by the door something moved. Leona saw it first but then again she had been looking for it. Though half closed eyes she checked the men, happy to see that both were completely focused on her struggles. For the moment the unusual extra occupant of the room remained unnoticed. As Leona watched, their strange guest scurried quickly from door to cabinet, cabinet to bed, bed to table, each move bringing it a little closer to the captive girl and her tormentor. There was a brief explosion of activity as the little guest completed the final stage and slipped under the couch, the move almost too quick to see.

Almost....

Leona saw Peter's eyes widen, a brief grunt of surprise, horror and alarm coming from his tightly gagged mouth. It was an unusual sound and it seemed to hang in the air for a moment.  Leona saw Gerber's forehead wrinkle into a frown. He started to turn....

"Ummmm," Leona panted. She closed her eyes, head thrown back. Straining against the cords she raised her ass from the chair, wiggling her shaved crotch seductively. Gerber looked own, noticing how the girl's pink sex was opening like a flower, drops of dew clinging to her petals. For a moment Peter was forgotten as he looked into the bound girl's eyes. He found her looking at him through her lashes, her down turned, submissive eyes begging silently. There was a need there, a sexy plea for attention mixed with a slight look of embarrassment.

Gerber found himself laughing. He was under orders not to fuck the girl but now it seemed that she wanted to fuck him. He was about to shake his head when Peter moaned again

Irritated Gerber turned to find Peter giving him a frantic, warning look.

"What is it Comrade?" Gerber asked in Russian. "Afraid I will have your woman?"

Peter shook his head and looked frantically towards the couch. Gerber frowned again and glanced in that direction. Turning back to the bound man he scowled, just what was Peter up to?

"Ummmm," Leona moaned, thrusting her chest out suggestively. Gerber turned. Whatever Peter was up to it would have to wait. The girl was hot right now and a real robber in this situation would surely have taken what he wanted. Gerber decided that in order to maintain his cover he almost had to fuck her.

Smiling he rubbed his tented pants.

"You want Ivan?" he asked the girl in deliberately bad English. Leona looked submissively downwards again and flushed with embarrassment. Finally she looked up and nodded, her eyes pleading, a small whimper escaping from her throat.

Gerber laughed and tugged on one of the cords that bound the girl to the chair.

"Cut," he said in English, "no fight?" He waved a finger in front of her face and shook his head for extra emphasis.

Leona nodded, gave a small moan and looked up at him with wide, begging blue eyes. She would behave.

Gerber laughed. He was no fool, he realized that the girl was probably up to something but it didn’t matter what her game was, Gerber was going to make sure she remained completely helpless while he fucked her.

Taking a penknife from his pocket he sliced through the ropes that bound her torso to the chair. Grabbing a big handful of hair he pulled her forward ignoring her moans of protest while he checked the ropes around her upper arms and the tightness of the handcuffs. Finding her still tightly bound he took the opportunity to check her gag, he nodded as he checked the knot, still nice and tight with no chance that she could make enough noise to be heard by the men downstairs.

Satisfied that she was still helpless he took the cords that he had just cut from her body and started to untie them finally ending up with one good length. Reaching down he started to tie the new rope around her ankle just above the cuff of rope that bound it to the chair. Once that ankle was done he started to tie the other using the new rope as a short hobble.

Leona looked down and understood. After her performance earlier the man was taking no chances, he would always insure that she was tightly bound and unable to fight back. She sighed but allowed the man to tie her. After all, while he was working he was ignoring Peter's increasingly frantic attempts to warn him of the danger.

Once Leona's legs were bound to Gerber's satisfaction he cut her free of the chair and pulled her to her feet. For a moment he just held on to her arm, the other hand exploring her half naked body starting with her erect nipples then continuing down to her pink, dripping sex. Even if her sudden cooperation was a trick there was no denying that her arousal and her sexual need were very real. Laughing Gerber pulled her helpless body to him, grabbing her hair and wrenching her head to one side while he kissed her long, slender neck. Leona gave a low, animal moan and rubbed her crotch against him. His balls aching with need Gerber needed no further encouragement. Grabbing her arm he dragged her towards the couch. Leona went like a lamb, subdued and beaten, her body quaking with sexual need.

As they neared the Chaise lounge Peter's gagged moaning and frantic struggles increased. Gerber looked over at his former boss and sneered. Gerber had felt more than a little guilty about the way the Corporation was using Peter, but at that moment Peter was being an ass.

Gerber lead the hobbled Leona the short distance to the couch and pushed her down onto it. Pinning the leg closest to him against the side of the couch he untied it, using the length of cord to bind her other ankle to the frame. With her legs held open she was easy to control and it wouldn't be possible for her to deny him. Laughing he started to toy with her pink slit, spreading her juices up and down her shaved sex. Trembling now he started to unbutton his pants, reaching down to free his erection. On the bed Peter screamed again and Gerber laughed.

"Watch while I fuck the boss’ daughter Comrade," he said in Russian, "I have a confession for you. We have orders from her father to kill you tonight. So tell me, do you still feel so protective of our little princess?”

Gerber smiled at Peter’s shocked look. It was priceless, but it would be even better when Peter watched Gerber take the sweet pussy he had been after himself.

Just then something brushed against Gerber’s thigh. Thinking it was Leona's free leg he grabbed the ankle. Still the sensation continued. About the moment his lust addled brain realized that her leg couldn't be in two placed at the same time he felt a sudden sheering pain in his thigh and glanced down......

.......and his heart stopped.

By Earth standards the spider was a giant, its body was the size of a football, black, smooth and shiny except for a small red mark near the base of the thorax. Eight long black legs radiated out from the body, each about three feet long with a joint about half way down it's length. Had Gerber been an entomologist he would have realized that this was the body configuration of a fast hunting spider rather than a species that spun an intricate web. However, at that moment his full attention was concentrated on the giant insect's head, which was about the size of a large coconut, with 5 small green eyes that looked up at him unblinkingly. Below the eyes a wide set of jaws were locked firmly on Gerber's thigh, pumping their poison into his shocked and quivering body.

For a moment Gerber and the spider looked at each other, the man frozen with shock and fear, the spider just sitting and pumping venom into its victim. By the time the man recovered from the shock it was already too late, his own racing heart had carried the spider's neurotoxin to Gerber's brain. The German felt a flash of nausea, an itching sensation from every part of his body and then a sudden loss of control. A moment later he slipped from the couch and onto the floor, his panicked mind still active even though his body was completely paralyzed.

Leona winked at the spider as it sat next to her on the couch. She felt a strange kinship with the creature, they both had an alien implant in their brains to control them and ensure their loyalty, both were servitors, the slaves of their dark Master.

Using her implant she instructed the giant insect to gnaw through the cords that bound her arms and upper body. While the spider worked Leona turned her attention to the handcuffs that still imprisoned her wrists. She was starting to regret fighting the men earlier, it was doubtful that they would have wasted a pair of cuffs on her if she had been content to play the helpless heroine.

Leona cleared her mind, extending it into the cuffs, tasting them, finding their true nature.  Like with the chocolate box that morning the physicality of the cuffs started to fade to be replaced with energy fields and crystal matrices. For a moment she felt the cuffs fiery birth as the hot steel was warped by a hydraulic press.... then her mind entered the workings, deduced the cuff mechanism, springs, ratchets, levers, the interrelationship of  parts, her mind probing, testing, looking for the flaw in the design, a fundamental weakness. It took longer than she had expected, the Corporation spared no expense when it came to capture equipment and it took her three attempts before she saw what she was looking for. Then suddenly there it was, a weakness, a single metal pin used as the core of a ratchet gear. She focused on the two pins, accelerating the effects on entropy on the metal's ghostly atomic structure, feeling the crystal lattice weaken and fail.

There was a cracking sound and the cuffs sprang open. By happy coincidence the spider finished gnawing on the cords at that same moment.

Leona reached up and untied the scarf from behind her head, then she pulled the packing from her mouth and took a deep, satisfied breath. Quickly she untied her bound ankle and stood.

Down by her feet the paralyzed Gerber lay on his side. He was breathing shallowly, as if he was asleep and it was only the look of helpless horror in his wide eyes that showed he was still conscious. Over on the bed Peter still struggled to free himself, his gagged cries too weak to be heard outside. For a moment he paused and looked beggingly at Leona.

"Ummm?" he whimpered.

Now it was Leona's turn to laugh. "Peter dearest," she said coyly, "I am not about to untie you." She giggled and stepped over the frozen Gerber, her high heels clipping on the polished wooden floorboards. "You see," she continued, "I know all about the Corporation and its silly little plots. I know all about the offer from dear Alison's uncle and I know you staged this robbery to cover her kidnapping. Now if you lie quietly like a good little boy then I _may_ let you live."

Peter struggled harder against the cords but it soon became obvious that he wasn't going anywhere. Leona slinked the last few feet then sat on the edge of the bed by Peter's side. Reaching down she took his limp cock in her gloved hand and squeezed. Much to Peter's surprise he became hard with her first silken touch.

"You see Peter you have lied to yourself," she said as her hand slowly worked his erection, "all these years you thought yourself so dominant when in truth you crave to be my plaything."

Peter moaned and weakly shook his head in denial. Leona just gave him a knowing smile as her gloved hand played up and down his rapidly hardening cock. Three long strokes were enough to bring him to full erection. Leona bent down and sucked on his manhood, using her tongue to stroke his glands before taking him deeply in her throat. Smiling she cupped his balls, the tips of her gloved fingers playing over them as her head bobbed up and down. Peter moaned and twitched, helpless to interfere as the blonde girl dragged him closer to orgasm. By now he was so desperate, he thrust up, trying to fuck her mouth.

Leona stopped.

Peter moaned, eyes wide, begging for completion, as for the second time that night he found himself denied. The familiar ache returned to his balls as Leona straightened up and looked towards Gerber and the spider.

"What?" she asked.

The spider tilted its head then looked towards the paralyzed Gerber.

"You want to eat him?" Leona asked as the creatures needs where relayed though her implant.

The spider somehow managed to look embarrassed and then nodded.

"Didn't I tell you to eat _before_ we left the house?" the blonde girl asked.

The spider managed to look embarrassed a second time and then gave a small, resentful nod.

"You will have to wait," Leona said firmly, "the Master has plans for him." She turned to the naked man tied to the bed. "Giant spiders," she said rolling her eyes, "I tell you Peter they are worse than children, you can’t take them anywhere!" Turning to the spider she beckoned. "Guard this one," she ordered, pointing at the helpless Peter, "but don't eat him." She turned and gave Peter a worrying smile. "*I* have plans for this one......."

Bending down she gave his manhood a parting slurp. The spider scuttled over, quickly climbing the bed sheets before settling on Peter's chest. Five green eyes, each with a vertical slit iris like a cat, looked deeply into Peter's wide and terrified orbs.

Leona smiled. "Now play nice," she warned sternly, "I have to leave you alone for a while." She sighed. "So little time and so many people to kill," she said, running her fingers over Peter's naked chest, "but don’t worry my love, I'll be back soon and then the fun can *really* start."

Still smiling she stood and walked over to Gerber’s frozen body. It only took her a moment to take the man’s revolver from his holster. Happy that she was now armed Leona turned towards the door ready to fulfill her mission to slaughter her Master's enemies. Back on the bed Peter and the spider eyed each other wearily.

It was going to be a long night....