Semper F

"Don't go down this block," Major Wood commented, nodding to his left "it goes past the Russian embassy, they record everything." It was a good thing the top brass was giving the Major a few days to show me the ropes before I replaced him on this assignment; we weren't even half through our patrol yet, and there had to be a dozen places I had to know to avoid. That's just one of the dangers of being someplace where you're not supposed to be; it's vitally important that no one can prove you were there.

"Have they launched any attacks recently?" I asked as we turned the corner on the next block.

"Nah," he replied, "I think they're on their heels and reeling—but don't be surprised if OUR guys launch another offensive soon." I nodded and silently fell in step.

I can't tell you where this conversation took place because, as I said, I was somewhere where officially I wasn't supposed to be. Suffice to say was in a small, eastern European, former Soviet bloc country that was having a border war with a neighbor that, to an outsider, might as well have been its twin. The G7 viewed the whole thing as beneath them and refused to acknowledge the conflict; I don't know if any Western sources even reported there even was a war on. Yet for reasons I don't know—really, it's not that I can't tell you, it's that I have no clue myself—the State Department wanted to make sure that this side, not that side, came out on top in the conflict. So the CIA made sure this side had plenty of guns and ammo—Russian-made, of course, to hide our involvement—and sent in a handful of U.S. Marines as advisors to assist the marginally trained and largely uneducated military. Our involvement had to be absolutely secret—if our existence became known, the Pentagon would deny any knowledge of our presence in the country and would hang us out to dry. Those kinds of stipulations really didn't bother me; as a single guy with no girlfriend or family to speak of but a taste for adventure, I was making a career out of assignments like this. Major Wood had held this post since the onset of US involvement, but now he was being recalled to Washington, so this rotation would be mine for the foreseeable future.

We continued down the block when suddenly I burst out "Wow...look at THAT!" In the next block, coming out of a nondescript concrete warehouse just like every other building in this neighborhood, had popped a tall, slim, very beautiful girl. Her hair was brownish with blonde highlights and she was wrapped in some sort of dressing gown and had a cigarette in her mouth. She fetched something from a small but brand-spanking new euro-Ford and just as quickly popped back into the building. I'd had a lot of assignments in burqa-wearing countries recently, so even from a distance she was the hottest thing I'd seen in a long time.

"Yup..." he said appreciatively. He glanced my way for a second, reading my face, then added "you know who that is, don't you?"

I looked at him like he had just asked me to recite the Declaration of Independence in Arabic. I just got here; how the fuck was I supposed to know the locals by name? Reading my dumbfounded expression, he laughed "you don't, do you? Well, as it happens that's the next stop on our rounds. Now you'll get to see what really keeps the economy of this little burg running..." I had no idea what he was talking about.

Arriving at the warehouse, we entered through a door at the far edge of the building. Inside it was a big wide open expanse inside, piled high with dusty crates of who knows what. There could have been old Soviet nukes in there for all anyone knew. As we walked towards the middle of the building, I became aware of frequent flashes of bright light somewhere ahead—almost like a strobe, only irregular. Then I heard a voice, and it struck me that it was speaking English: "Nice...now a little forward...good...and smile...and now give me that look—yeah, that's the way..." We emerged past a ceiling-high stack of crates to find a photo studio had been set up in the open space in the middle of the floor. Against a fake backdrop, the girl from the parking lot sat on the ground, naked except for a loose shirt that was unbuttoned and carefully situated to make sure that her perky breasts were totally exposed for the camera. She sat with her legs apart, spreading her pussy lips wide with one hand while leaning back on the other, giving the camera a heart-stoppingly sexy look.

"Safety patrol!" Major Wood called out. Suddenly aware of our presence, the girl snapped her legs together and drew them up to her chest, hiding the naughty bits she had so enticingly displayed to the camera moments before.

"Hey, Woody!" the photographer called, looking over his shoulder. Turning back to the model, he said, "uh, take five, OK Zasha?" She nodded and dove for the dressing gown I had seen her wearing from afar, now crumpled on the floor just beyond the view of the lens.

"How's it goin, Nick?" the Major asked jovially, shaking the photographer's hand.

"Pretty good...Zasha's a real pro, easy to work with," he replied. "two more days of shooting and I can get the hell out of here."

"Goin' home?"

"Nah, not for another couple weeks, but I'll be a lot farther from the front," he continued, "things look like they'll be pretty quiet til then?"

"Should be pretty quiet I think, no quick unscheduled exits this time," he answered. "By the way, I'll be shipping out in two days. Captain ------ here will be relieving me."

"Nice to meet you," said Nick, shaking my hand like he was meeting someone's buddy at the corner tap. He wasn't what I had imagined a porn photographer would be like.

"Call me Tom," I answered.

Nick and Major Wood chatted a bit more. I stole glances at Zasha—she was even more beautiful up close, one the most beautiful women I had ever seen in the flesh. And man, had I ever seen her in the flesh, if only for a tantalizing instant. She paid no attention to us; smoking another cigarette, she was yakking rapidly into a new-looking cell phone.

"Well, we'd better continue on our rounds...see you later," the Major called as he headed back down the hallway to the far end of the warehouse.

"Keep me safe!" he called out after us, only half jesting, getting ready to resume shooting.

Reluctantly I dragged myself away; just watching the shoot would have been the closest thing to sex I'd had in at least a year. But as always, duty before pleasure. Once we were out of earshot, I asked "we're seeing him later?"

"Our rounds pass through this way twice," he answered, "not because it's fun to watch, either; I wasn't kidding about the economic importance of porn. No one will admit it, of course, but it's one this country's five biggest export commodities."

"Export commodity?" I asked incredulously. Let's just say it wasn't the way I usually thought about that particular subject.

"Look, regardless of what you might think of it, porn equals cash," he explained. "There's a few local shooters, but mostly producers fly in guys from other countries to set up shop for a week or two and shoot local girls. They usually do stills in the morning, then bring in the film crews for the afternoon. It's not just here, you know—every one of these new eastern European republics, if they were honest, would have to admit that pussy was one of their chief exports."

We passed through the door to the outside and continued down the street. I looked over my shoulder; her shiny bright blue car stood in sharp contrast to the dingy, drab Soviet-made sedans and trucks elsewhere on the streets. The advent of capitalism had not as yet produced car washes, either, it seemed.

"It's a good deal for all sides really," he continued. "The producers keep coming back because they can get hotter chicks for the same cash. For the girls, it's the only means to getting a better life. In the states, a girl as pretty as Zasha might find a rich husband or try her luck in Hollywood, but around here porn is pretty much her only option. Take off your clothes, maybe screw a guy or two and even an unknown can make as much money in a day as she would working three months in the factory. And if they become popular enough to land their own websites they can make a LOT more. Zasha's one of those—she's got her own site, only in the business she's known as Jamela. Even if her cut on the site is only ten percent, she'll easily clear six figures. Only a handful of people in this whole goddamn country make that kind of money. Her site is pretty well-known, which is why I thought maybe you might recognize her."

Just thinking about her posing was starting to make walking uncomfortable, so I changed the subject. "So you think they're going to launch an offensive soon?"

"Within a week, I'd bet" he answered. Then he explained that in our role as advisors we had two primary objectives: one, try to keep the troops from doing stupid things that would get them killed. And two, make sure that NO atrocities are committed. As he put it, "the U.N. and Red Cross are ignoring this little conflict. It's vitally important that it stays that way. Got it?"

"Yes sir!"

"You might think it shouldn't be that hard to do," he noted prophetically, "except that both sides like to take each others' women as spoils of war."

There was considerably more activity in the warehouse when we passed through it again two hours later. There was a full video crew: multiple cameras, light guys, everything. Nick still carried his camera, but mostly he was directing now, and Zasha/Jamela was far to busy to notice us. She was straddling one guy's dick while a second filled her asshole at the same time, and she was loosely holding a third in her mouth. She was looking back at the camera, trying at Nick's behest to bend herself in such a way that her tits could be seen hanging down without obstructing the view of the two dicks penetrating her. "The down side of being big enough to have your own web site," Major Wood commented, "is trying to satisfy the insatiable demand for new material." With that we silently turned and continued on our way.

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

The Major was off by a day. On the eighth day after my arrival that the army launched an offensive strike. Their objective was to capture a small city near the border. The military's rhetoric was that this town was rightfully theirs dating back to some Count in the 12th century. They conveniently neglected to mention that it had been captured by force then, too, and only held for about 10 years before reverting to the other side.

Although I wore a large white banner over my fatigues with the words "International Observer" in red, bullets and explosions are blind so I stayed with the rear guard, listening to radio reports of troop movements. I spent a lot of time in the back of an ancient Jeep, watching 3-D maps of the town on my military laptop and occasionally radioing in advice—simple things like beware of snipers on such and such street because it can be seen from the church bell tower. The two armies clashed out in the open streets, but their army was not expecting that this would be our target, so they were slow in organizing defenses. Consequently, we controlled a good chunk of the city before we met any real resistance. Citizens fled from our advance, but some were either slow to respond or didn't have time to escape and now found themselves on the wrong side of the line and were reduced to hiding in the safest places they could find.

We advanced fairly rapidly through the southern half of town, but when we got to the river, where access was restricted to three narrow bridges, their defenses were able to stem our attack. By controlling the bridges they were able to draw our advance to a halt. Both sides shot away at each other across the river, gradually leveling the real estate on either side but doing minimal actual damage to either force. As night fell, the commanders elected to hold their positions for now and allow their troops to rest for a second push the next day. They may as well have come right out and said "let the looting begin." because that's what happened. Soldiers broke into stores looking for money, liquor, or drugs. The USMC would never have stood for such shenanigans, but as if I needed reminding, I was a long way from home. Disgusted, I marched up and down the main streets as the melee continued, making sure that the soldiers' mayhem was restricted to property. A few of these rocket scientists had the bright idea of burning places down, until I screamed at them

"You idiots...you'll burn down the city with us still in it!"

. At least, I hope that's what I think said, based on my 10-day crash course in the language.

A few blocks up, I noticed a number of soldiers rushing in and out of a small apartment building. A lot of them were jabbering as they came out, much of which I think translated as "check it out." I thought I had better be the one checking it out. I squeezed past a number of soldiers and soon found what all the fuss was all about—there were two terrified girls in the tattered remains of bikinis on the floor, hands tied to a heavy table, being gang-raped. Perhaps they had the bad luck of sunbathing on the roof when the attack came; now their were hands groping them everywhere and men taking turns shoving their dicks into mouths, pussies, or whatever they could get their hands on. Major Wood's "spoils of war" comment resounded in my head. I tried to convince myself that this wasn't international incident material, since invading armies had been raping conquered women for thousands of years. The reality was that the one of me had no chance to reign in the collective lust of two dozen horny soldiers.

Something else was also going on in the room at the end of the hall. With a disgusted snort, I headed down the hall to see what was going on there. At first all I could see was a tightly drawn circle of men all standing around something. I pressed in and found another young girl, no more than 20, blindfolded, top torn down to her waist, being used as a bukkake target. The men groped her while jerking themselves, stuffed their dicks into her mouth, or attempted to fuck her closed fists. Her face and upper torso were already splattered from multiple ejaculations, and there was no end in sight—it seemed that for whatever reason they wanted to cover her in as much cum as possible.

Shaking my head, I headed back down the hall to the first room. Before I even got there, however, I heard high-pitched cries. A different guy was fucking one of the girls, but while his dick was in her box what really seemed to be getting him off was slapping her, hard, in her defenseless face. The other guys had kind of backed away from him, which just encouraged him. Her face was streaming tears, and she was petrified. Without even thinking of what I was trying to accomplish, I pulled my sidearm—my only weapon, given my role here—grabbed him by the hair, and held the barrel right up to his temple.

"Have your little fun if you must,"

I snarled as best I could given my tenuous grasp of their language,

"but if you harm an unarmed civilian, you're going to have to answer to ME!"

I gave him a little shove for emphasis as I let him go. He fell forward, catching himself, then in one quick motion whipped up, pulled up his pants, and glowered at me. I stared right back at him. I was grossly outnumbered, but I was here at the request of his government—their commanders would not take kindly were they to hurt me. Cliché though it may be, the tension was so thick you could cut it with a knife.

Behind me, I heard one of his buddies saying

"Sergei, let it go."

Cursing me and Americans in general, he made a point to brush into me as he headed down the hall to the bukkake room. I made out the last name "Stovlich" on his uniform as he went by.

I looked around at the others; each turned away as I turned my gaze at them. A lot of them suddenly lost interest in screwing the two poor young girls and headed down the stairs. One, however, saw this as his opportunity to have one to himself and dove in. Feeling the need to de-escalate, I turned and left.

Walking down the street, I felt bad for those three girls. I felt reasonably confident that they wouldn't be physically harmed after my confrontation, but they might end up knocked up, or worse—I knew many of the soldiers frequented the prostitutes that plied their trade near the base. Major Wood had told me "you'd be amazed what you could get a pretty decent-looking girl to do for 50 American dollars...but don't blame me if you come out of it with a permanent souvenir." It would be a miracle if they DIDN'T catch something after getting laid by 20 or 30 of them. I was brooding, lost in thought when my wandering down the looted streets took me past what had been a pharmacy. I remembered that penicillin was used to treat syphilis, and thought that maybe I could get some to those three teens once the men had had their fun, maybe it could kill whatever social bugs the soldiers left behind. My heart sank when I walked through the frame that had once been a glass door—the floor was littered with the large bottles used to fill prescriptions. I waded through a sea of pills to the counter, about to give up, when I realized that originally, they had sorted alphabetically. Most of them probably didn't fall far from where they had been stored; it wouldn't hurt to look around a little. I found where the penicillin belonged, bent down and started wading through bottles. Most of them were meaningless, one of them seemed to ring a bell deep in the back of my head, enough that I retrieved it and read the label again: Mifegyne. Mifegyne, mifegyne... I smiled when I remembered why that name rang a bell. Stationed in Germany shortly after enlisting, the old-timers told us that if we got in a jam with one of the local girls, there was place we could get Mifegyne—better known to us as RU-486—to get yourself off the hook. I could think of a couple of girls who might find that useful right now. I continued searching until I also found the penicillin, then headed back towards the gang-bang den.

I got there just in time to see the Sergeant rounding up his reluctant and sheepish-looking troops and marching them back towards camp. I walked in and found the poor girls still tied to the table, sobbing. Their sobbing increased as they saw me, and one gasped in panic when she saw me draw my knife, not realizing I meant her no harm. I cut the ropes holding them down, and they both rolled up into the fetal position, hugging their knees and sobbing. I tried to talk to them in our side's language, but despite sharing a border they didn't comprehend. I had better luck, to my surprise, using English, which one of the two seemed to understand well enough. I pulled the two bottles I'd rescued from the pharmacy out of my pack. "If you don't want to get pregnant," I said slowly and loudly, patting a pretend belly to help communicate, "take two of these." Then I shook out a number of the antibiotics, saying "take one of these a day for ten days and maybe you won't catch any diseases." The both nodded dumbly, no doubt in shock from their ordeal. "Now go find some clothes and run as far away from here as you can!" They didn't need to be told twice.

Now the cum-covered girl. She might not need RU-486, but she was DEFINITELY going to need a towel. There was a bathroom down the hall, which I opened in search of a towel but immediately closed. Apparently, celebrating one's victory included taking a shit on the enemy's floor. Further along, though, I found a reasonably unsoiled towel on the floor. Picking it up, I realized some guy had wiped his dick in it—just more of the same, in this case, so I picked it up. When I opened the door to the bukkake room, I almost bumped into the blindfolded girl as she knee-walked across the floor. She started saying something I didn't understand—she must have figured out she was alone and was trying to find her way to the door, although how she was going to open it with her hands tied to her ankles I don't know. I pulled out my knife again and cut through her ropes. As she wriggled her wrists and ankles free of the rope, I began wiping her cum-covered face with the towel, at least enough so that I could take the blindfold off without a cascade of goo falling into her eyes. I handed her the towel and undid her blindfold; standing, she worked silently to wipe more of the gobs of cum from her body.