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Copyright Oggbashan 4 July 2004 The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

This is a work of fiction. The events described here are imaginary; the settings and characters are fictitious and are not intended to represent specific places or living persons.

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I was shot through the head with an AK47. It was a mistake. I was with the international press covering a war zone but not as the intrepid TV reporter. I was just an assistant who carried bags, took notes and made the tea. The war had ended and the victors were celebrating. We were standing on the balcony of the hotel watching when one of the bullets fired at the sky passed through my head.

I was knocked backwards as the bullet hit. I was falling in slow motion to the floor of the balcony and seeing my colleagues’ faces frozen with shock. Everything went black.

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I came back to consciousness in a hospital bed. I was connected to beeping monitors, had a tube in my throat and a drip connected to my wrist. I had a dry mouth and felt too hot. I turned my head slightly to see Greg sitting beside me.

“Urgh,” was all I managed to say. That was not a very romantic greeting for my intended husband. It seemed to have a dramatic effect.

“Jan!” he breathed. “Welcome back.”

He leant over me and kissed me. He pressed a bell push beside the bed.

“Lay still.” He ordered. “Someone will come to check you over.”

I was checking myself. I could feel my limbs. I could wiggle my toes and fingers. I had just turned my head. I shut my eyes and opened them again. Greg came back into focus. I couldn’t move my arms and legs. Perhaps they had been strapped down while I was unconscious?

An attractive young West Indian nurse came in to the room. She had a developed figure that I would kill for. She looked at me. I blinked at her. Her eyes flashed across the bank of monitors beside the bed.

“Hello Jan,” she said. “I’ll get the doctor to see you.”

She left the room in a dignified hurry. I watched her arse waggle as she went through the door. She was female and it showed. I turned back to look at Greg. His face was tired and drawn under the tan. His light brown hair was as unruly as usual with the tuft at the back sticking up. His smile made me feel warm inside. Life couldn’t be too bad if Greg was beside me. His hand stroked mine. I curled my fingers around his. He hadn’t noticed the nurse’s attractions. He had been looking at me all the time.

“Don’t try to talk, Jan.”

I couldn’t. There was too much in my mouth.

The door swung open as the nurse returned with a small Asian doctor. He was wearing a white coat with a stethoscope draped around his neck. His name label said Doctor Ali. I suppose there are only a few hundred similarly named doctors. “Doctor Ali” is more common than “Doctor Smith”.

“Hello Jan,” Doctor Ali said. “First things first. We’ll get the tube out of your throat, give you a sip of water, then you can talk.”

He did it as he spoke. The nurse held a plastic cup to my mouth. The water was warm and flat but the effect was great. I swilled it around my dry mouth and swallowed. That hurt slightly as it went down my throat.

“Thank you,” I croaked.

Doctor Ali turned to my intended.

“Greg? Would you leave us for a quarter of an hour, please? I need to run some tests on Jan. It will be easier for both of you if you are not here.”

Greg nodded. “See you soon, Jan.”

He squeezed my hand and left the room. The nurse pulled a curtain across the glazed door. She and Doctor Ali pulled the bedclothes off me. Under them I was completely nude. I looked down. I was distressed by the length of the hair on my legs. How long had I been unconscious? That much hair couldn’t have grown in a few days or weeks.

Doctor Ali stroked the soles of my feet. My toes curled. I squeezed his hand with my left hand, then my right. So far so good. Then the bad news hit me. I still felt as if my legs and arms were tied down. I couldn’t move them. My hands wiggled. My feet wiggled. My legs and arms were immobile. I looked at Doctor Ali with tears in my eyes.

“My arms and legs don’t move,” I sobbed.

“I was afraid they wouldn’t,” he said. “It is early yet. Now you are with us, we can try to find out what is wrong.”

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Three months later I was discharged from hospital in a wheelchair. My arms and legs still don’t work. There is a faint possibility that something could be done, but not on the National Health Service. The cost would be enormous.

Then Greg did something that I wouldn’t have agreed to if I had known about it. He went to his bosses who owned a TV station and a national scandal-rag newspaper. They planned a campaign to raise money for treatment. He even got my parents to co-operate. Between all of them they set up a massive media launch.

The first I knew about it was on the national news on TV. There I was as the local beauty queen five years ago, the home movies of me winning a skiing competition, and even rock climbing. Then there were pictures of me being evacuated on a stretcher surrounded by TV crews. The story ended with an appeal “Can you help Jan to walk again?”

I was angry. My private grief had been splashed across the TV news. It got worse. The scandal-rag printed pictures of me on their Page Three, topless. I thought those photos had been destroyed but I was the Page Three girl for a week. On Saturday they printed the one with just my hand covering my cunt. I had been wearing a G-string but they edited that out. I was nude for their million or so readers to drool over.

What hurt even more than the exposure of my body was the thought that thousands of men might be jacking off over my picture and enjoying themselves. All I could do was stay still while Greg humped me. He could put his cock into my fingers and I could squeeze. He could put it in my mouth and I could suck. He had to move my legs to penetrate me. I couldn’t hold him or cuddle him. That made me cry.

I argued with Greg about it. I hurt him. I know I did but I was hurt as well. I didn’t like being a charity appeal. I felt that he had sold my body or at least images of it.

I came round after a couple of weeks. I had thousands of ‘get-well’ messages from strangers. A group recorded a pop record for the appeal, then played a “Birthday Concert for Jan”. I had to be wheeled on to the stage. Greg held my arm up while I wiggled my fingers at the crowd. Their response was amazing. Ten thousand people sang ‘Happy Birthday’ to me. I cried. My tears were shown live on TV to five million.

The money rolled in. After the concert the total had reached two million pounds. For what? For a faint chance that someone might be able to help me.

More important than the money was an offer from a medical research unit near Cambridge University. They worked mainly on robotic arms and legs for people who were missing a limb or two. They thought that they might be able to do something for me because it was the nerve signals that were wrong.

Greg drove me to Cambridge. At the door of the unit I met Doctor Ali again. He had come, bringing my medical notes, to discuss my case with the researchers. Three TV crews recorded my arrival. Microphones were thrust into my face. I answered the questions as blandly as I could. How could I answer “When do you think you will walk again?” when I hadn’t been given any hope yet?

All I could say was to thank those who were supporting me, and even praying for me. The prayers helped. Even though I was not religious, the idea that Christians, Muslims, Hindus and other groups were praying for my recovery was comforting. I felt as if all those people were giving me a cuddle. Whenever I was beginning to feel depressed or upset the thought of those prayers brought me hope again.

The first hour in the laboratory raised my hopes sky high. Electrodes attached to my arms and legs made them twitch and move. I could even flick the switches with my fingers and move my limbs myself. The movements were crude and uncontrolled but… My limbs were wasted with disuse.

The researchers, Doctor Ali, and Greg were all pleased. I had several hugs. After some practice I managed a swing an arm to tap Greg on his rump when he wasn’t looking. That made him jump, then both of us burst out laughing.

Greg and I moved to the research unit, with our own TV crew. We had several mobile homes placed on a field, plumbed and wired in with adaptations for my wheelchair in my one. Greg had one as well. I enjoyed the limited independence that a few gadgets gave me. I could use the telephone, the TV, the computer and even make a cup of tea with commands from a keypad under my fingers. I still needed help to drink the tea.

Doctor Ali and a team of nurses were there as well. They were paid with money from the charity. They were happy. I wasn’t a demanding patient and I was making progress. The TV crew recorded everything. There was a weekly programme for a quarter of an hour every Friday night showing what was being done. The programme had a high viewing rating and brought in more money each week.

The researchers were happy as well. They were being paid and their facility was getting national coverage once a week. They were attracting funds and more research into different fields. The funds meant that they could treat more limbless people most of whom wanted to meet me. Why not? Their courage and persistence in face of difficulties were amazing. They seemed to think that it was a big deal to meet me and sometimes get a cameo role on the TV programme.

Eventually the researchers had a trial system for my right arm. They had inserted pick-ups into my upper arm that could be stimulated by electrodes on the skin. They connected the electrodes to a keypad under my left hand. They told me what to do. I tried. My right arm lifted from my lap. I swung it sideways. It felt like controlling a fairground coin in the slot crane. Left. Up a bit. Right. Down a bit.

I played for hours. At the end I was tired but I could reach to a table in front of me, pick up a cup off a saucer and bring it to my lips to drink. It was half full of water. I had a plastic sheet draped across me or I would have been soaked through. The first dozen cupfuls I poured down my front, recorded faithfully by the TV crew. They also caught my delight when I drank my first sip without spilling.

After that progress seemed to be at a crawl again. I was fitted with more pick-ups in my left arm and in both legs. The legs were difficult. Raising and lowering them was easy. Walking was impossible. I had to be slung in a harness and suspended from a gantry so that I wouldn’t fall. Each time I lifted one leg I would overbalance to be caught by the harness. I couldn’t move the second leg to compensate for the change of weight.

The keypad system was a dead end. I practised hard to regain the strength in my limbs. Yet after weeks of practice I still couldn’t control my major muscles. Press 1034 then (enter) to lift right arm and turn my hand over wasn’t natural. The researchers and doctors went back to the design basics. The doctors prodded and probed to find the exact point where the link between my damaged brain and the nerves controlling my muscles ended.

Some research found on the Internet provided the breakthrough. An American university had been doing some defence contracts on thought control of aircraft. The spin-offs from that had led to them linking a sensor on the scalp to a mechanical arm. They could pick up a coin from a table by thinking at the arm. Some of the researchers flew to the US university and stayed for three months while I went slowly crazy trying to remember thousands of keypad numbers. By the time they got back I had managed to walk three steps before collapsing. Those steps were a great hit on the TV programme, as was my slow ‘Royal’ arm wave to my fans.

They brought back a skeleton helmet made to fit my head. It picked up my brain electricity. They routed those signals through a computer and back to the pick-ups in my limbs. The results were immediate and wonderful. Within days I could move my arms slowly but steadily and stop any movement instantly. I could move both arms at once. I looked like Frankenstein’s monster with the helmet on my head. For the TV cameras the helmet was covered with a large headscarf.

At the end of the week I could write again. I had been able to type with my fingers but writing with a pen had been impossible. Now I was learning my handwriting again.

Best of all, I could hug Greg. I did as often as I could. My control wasn’t good. He either had my best effort at a bear hug squashing the breath out or a gentle tickle. He jumped when I moved my hand to his cock and closed around it. He was afraid I would rip it off. He shouldn’t have worried. Despite the exercises I was still weak. I could wrap my arms around him while he pounded into me. My legs were still difficult but I could spread them by myself.

Why Greg had stayed the course I don’t know. For all that I won a local beauty competition I wouldn’t say I was beautiful. I had less up top than many. I had reasonable legs and a pleasing face. My blonde curls helped the image. Greg had seen all of me so many times and done so much for me that there could be no illusions left. He had seen me at my worst. Yet he was still there beside me. He hadn’t even flirted with the nurses and they were a good-looking bunch. I had hugged them too. Delia, the West Indian nurse who had been there when I came round from my coma was a lovely armful. I enjoyed resting my head against her large soft breasts. She was Doctor Ali’s personal assistant. I wouldn’t be surprised if she was more than that for him.

After a couple of months the helmet was reduced to a small skullcap with small electrodes stuck on my forehead. That was much more practical to wear. The researchers hoped that they could reduce it still further and ultimately implant most of it under my skin.

One morning Delia found me in tears. The TV crew hadn’t arrived so I could be myself and I was unhappy that I couldn’t make love to Greg properly. I wanted to wrap my legs around him and squeeze. I had been trying but all that happened was a twitch. Delia persuaded me to tell her what was making me unhappy.

From then on, every morning Delia and I did a new exercise. She would position her legs between mine and I would try to lift my legs around her. She praised every slight movement. She would put a pillow between my legs at night. If I woke I would squeeze that pillow. For weeks all this was happened without Doctor Ali or Greg being aware. All they knew was that I could walk very slowly and stiffly. Delia’s work with me was our secret.

Our training wasn’t wholly one-sided. Delia and I discussed sex. I was surprised how naïve and innocent she had been. Apart from the missionary position she had never experimented. I talked to her about various positions, about oral and even anal sex. The last disgusted her so we passed over it. I persuaded her to buy some toys for me. I wore the batteries out in a couple of days. I showed her how to use one on herself. Her excited screams as she writhed over my bed were alarming. I had to shut her up with my hand pressed hard over her mouth. We cuddled each other afterwards. Delia’s breasts were as soft and comfortable as I had imagined.

It took all my persuasive skills to get Delia to wear a strap-on for one of my leg exercises. She penetrated me slowly and very carefully as if I would break. It seemed as if she was teasing me. I was so frustrated at the slowness of her penetration that I made a supreme effort. My legs swung around her and my ankles crossed. I pulled and the strap-on banged into me as if all her weight was behind it. Delia screamed. I screamed and locked my legs in spasm, clamping her immovably to me. I banged my hips up and down as Delia’s face paled. She had thought I was in pain. My frenzied movements showed that I wasn’t but she was struggling vainly to get out of my grip. I didn’t let her go until I had experienced three orgasms.

Both of us were covered in sweat when I unclasped my legs and released her. She accused me of being reckless and endangering myself. I assured her that far from hurting myself I had developed a new skill. When I suggested she tried locking her legs around Doctor Ali she grinned widely.

“I would shock him if I did that.”

“Why don’t you? Grab him with your legs and just hold on. If you become good at it you can roll over and ride him,” I said,

“Ride him? He’d be humiliated,” Delia replied.

“Why? A woman on top can do far more than a man realises. You can swing your breasts over his skin. Surely he likes yours?”

“Oh yes, that he does, Jan, but when we’re making love he squashes them.”

“If you are on top, you can squash him. Bury his face in your breasts and then move down. That excites most men…”

“I’ll try. What do we do about your new skill?”

“Greg will have a shock next time.”

“Ali will too.”

We left it at that. Greg made love to me about twice a week. I’d like more but the researchers and TV crew didn’t give us much free time alone. By now I spent most of my time out of the bed, either walking slowly and carefully or propelling myself in a wheelchair. I had even managed a short run pushing Delia in the wheelchair. That had been a great hit with the TV audience. At night I had been practising with the pillow between my legs.

Friday night Greg came to stay all night. We sat down on my bed to watch this week’s episode of Jan’s progress. The run pushing Delia was the highlight. Greg hadn’t seen me do it so it was a surprise to him. He hugged and kissed me as soon as the programme ended. The kissing went further – we ended up naked in my bed.

Now it was my chance. After prolonged foreplay Greg penetrated me. I let him thrust half a dozen times before my legs grabbed him. He squeaked! I bear hugged him, trapping his arms, as my legs clamped hard. I locked my legs and then I was in control. We moved to my pace, my direction. Greg’s smile grew as I milked him dry. He slumped across my body as he came into me. I exerted my muscle control to the limit as I rolled us over still clutching him inside me. His eyes opened wide as my lips covered his. His erection soon returned but I just held him still as I felt it grow inside me. He tried to buck his hips. I squashed his movement, pulling him deeper.

“Wait!” I ordered. “I’m the boss.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he replied.

I kept him still for about ten minutes. Then I squeezed my muscles around his expectant tool. I squeezed my arms, my legs and my vaginal muscles simultaneously and rhythmically until he was forced to ejaculate by the strength of my orgasms. The sense of controlling him was so erotic that I reached heights of pleasure that I hadn’t had before the injury. That night I felt that I was my own woman again. I rode Greg twice more that night. Eventually I let him sleep with his head resting on my breasts.

The next morning Greg was more exhausted than I. His twice-weekly sessions hadn’t prepared him for a night of passion.

Delia and I compared notes. She had ‘raped’, as she put it, Doctor Ali. He had protested volubly as she had rolled him underneath her. She had gagged him silent with her night-dress wound round and round his mouth while she enjoyed herself. Once she had released him he continued to object so she rode him again and again until he shut up. Poor Doctor Ali! He is about half Delia’s weight so I think he must have been flattened and banged into submission. I don’t think it was too terrible an experience. I saw him take Delia’s hand several times over the next week when he thought no one was watching.