Chapter 39

Later that morning, at spiral mark 63,577 of Black Mall

Time: Tuesday, January 29, 2019 9:58 AM

Amber looked at her list and then around the large sporting goods store, trying to find where the Bowie knives would be. Earlier her team had inspected the edge of Black Mall’s unlocked territory, but now she was alone on the second floor of Herman’s Wilderness Outfitters, performing what was now a boring daily routine of shopping. Amber yawned and thought for a moment. They should all be back home well before noon. Perhaps she would take a few minutes then to stare at the strange orange sun and the landscape. It was rather pretty. But in truth, maybe she would just collapse and take a nap.

Amber was low-person on C-team, a three member group comprised of herself, Ricardo, and Hernando. Hernando was nominally in charge, but nobody really gave Ricardo orders except Uno and possibly Alfredo, and even they were careful with what they said.

Tonight it would be thirteen days since Frida had run off, and so much had changed since then. Uno had organized the nine people with him into three three-person teams, and each team was on duty twelve hours a day, with no breaks whatsoever until Chico returned. And that was looking more and more unlikely with each passing day.

The C-team had the graveyard shift, guarding their Mall entrance at Jacob’s Bar and Grill from midnight to 8 AM. Then they would spend the next four hours making their daily fifteen-kilometer round-trip hike to Rabbies Dram, doing various shopping on the way back.

In the afternoon Amber would do a little eating, a little cleaning, a little collapsing, a little more eating, and then sack out after 3 PM and sleep for almost eight hours before getting up for a shower and starting the cycle all over again. This was her life, and she silently admitted to herself, it was pretty shitty.

The team that relieved her was the A-team, commanded by Alfredo who was Uno’s second-in-command now. A-team also included Diego and Whitney. Diego technically was fourth-in-command and could have been in command of C-team, but he had wanted no part of Ricardo and had persuaded Alfredo to let him be on A-team instead.

Amber didn’t know whether she would want to trade places with Whitney or not. Ricardo was genuinely frightening to Amber, but Alfredo was openly pressuring Whitney to submit to him for fucking, and it was easy for him to be alone with her. He would order Diego to shop a few stores away while A-team was on their daily hike. So far Alfredo had not raped Whitney, but he was open in his lust for her and would fondle her when they were alone, over and under her clothes, even after Whitney asked him to stop. Whitney had confided to Amber in despair that her rape seemed both imminent and inevitable.

The remaining three members of Alfonso, his whacky girlfriend Jessica, and Jenaro formed B-team, and they worked the swing shift, guarding Jacob’s Bar and Grill from 4 PM to midnight.

At last Amber spotted the Bowie-knife display. Uno had told her to pick up eight, one for everyone except Whitney and herself. She walked to the back of the deserted store and stood for a moment staring at the knives. Such thick blades, she thought, quite an impressive knife. And then for no apparent reason, she started to shudder, suddenly feeling the store was an eerie, creepy place to be in.

Amber screeched in shock. It felt as if a lobster had snapped a claw down low on her left buttock. The pressure was incredible and it brought tears to her eyes. She turned instinctively and tried to jerk away and failed. Ricardo! He had materialized behind her as if by magic.

“That was sloppy, Amber,” he said with a disdainful sneer. “Sloppy. Aren’t you ever aware of what’s going on around you?”

“Please, you’re hurting me,” she whispered through clenched teeth.

“This? This isn’t hurting. You don’t know what pain is, Amber. Pretty Amber. Such a pretty Amber.”

“Ricardo please, let me go!”

“I’m testing. Relax. Relax your butt muscle for me. I want to test something.”

Amber felt like shouting back, “Test what?!” But she knew better than to challenge a direct order from Ricardo when she was alone with him. Desperately hoping Hernando would somehow appear soon, she took a deep breath and tried to relax.

In a perfectly calm voice he went on. “That’s better. When I let go, I want you to turn to the counter and drop your pants to your ankles, panties too.” At the same time he spoke, his grip increased, and the pressure made Amber feel that her butt cheek was being torn apart in a vice of iron fingers. She gave an explosive gasp.

“Then bend over the counter for me, knees wide apart, as quickly as you can. Arch your ass up nice and high.”

“Ricardo?!”

“You heard me. I won’t tell you again. Amber, I can show you what true pain is. Is that what you want? It’s your choice. Move!”

Ricardo released his grasp. Amber sucked in a crying breath and realized she had no time to decide. But she had to decide. Would her life end like this, filled with pain at the hands of a madman? She had witnessed Ricardo’s version of true pain. She had been forced to watch Britney die from it, and had stayed up with Lynn the night she was branded.

Was it her turn now? She had tried so hard to be careful, but would she die now in a sporting goods store? Uno had promised her she would not be hurt, but Amber was dismayed to realize Ricardo could probably get away with her murder. Hernando didn’t know exactly where she was, and it would probably be easy to for Ricardo to hide her body in some useless store where it would never be found. The rest of the group would assume she ran away.

Or was she still willing to pretend Ricardo would leave her unharmed if she played his game? Did she really have a chance to have her life returned to her?”

“Frida got it back. I think she got it back for real,” Amber thought. “She offered to tell me something, something important, and I refused. And now...” Amber was out of time. She was beginning to see Ricardo’s body relax as he decided she was refusing him. She had noticed the effect before, Ricardo’s body looking totally relaxed before he would strike with lightning speed. What was his target now, her eyes, her throat, her kidneys? “Not my throat,” Amber thought. “There are so few people left to torture. He would not make my death so swift.” She finally realized she didn’t want to die, not here, not now, not like this.

“Okay!” she cried out loud and turned around, presenting her rump to Ricardo and fumbling with her belt. A moment later she bit her lip in frustration as she dropped her pants and panties to her ankles. Ricardo tapped the small of her back to remind her she wasn’t finished. Amber leaned over the counter, bending at the waist and pressing her knees as far apart as she could. Another tap on her tailbone and she rotated her pelvis and arched her ass up, completing Ricardo’s demand and her humiliation.

The glasslike top of the counter felt cool against her tummy and breasts, but at least she still had on her shirt. The counter was downright cold against the insides of her bare thighs and calves. Ricardo gave her butt a light tap, a warning she wasn’t quite in the right position, and Amber tried to hug up against the counter as tightly as she could. She was arching her tailbone up as Ricardo had demanded, as high as she could raise it, putting so much weight forward on the counter and the balls of her feet that she was almost on tiptoe. Amber stood there shivering, her butt and genitalia completely exposed and open, and she waited with shut eyes wondering about her chances for survival.

In absolute silence Ricardo poked the tender flesh on her butt where he had grabbed her so fiercely. Amber shivered on the counter, sensing that Ricardo was squatting on the floor behind her. She could feel his breath on her rump. She had no idea what would happen next. She was well aware that Ricardo was probing her right at his first choice for a branding spot. It felt as if he were testing the firmness of her bruised flesh. Did he think of himself as a surgeon, examining his patient before an operation?

Was his interest sexual? As far as she knew, he had never checked out a hoof pussy from the pussy barn. He had not even participated in group sex with the selections of the other three muchachos. Ricardo had called her pretty. It was the first time Amber had ever heard him give a compliment to anybody, even if sarcastically. But was he being sarcastic? Somehow, Amber was guessing he was sincere.

Ricardo was stroking the inside of her thigh with one hand while poking her butt with the other. At first the hand on her thigh was just a strong grip to lock her position. But now he was stroking up and down, back and forth slowly from her crotch almost to her knee, letting his hand brush against the fur of her pubis at the top of his stroke. Did he really think she was pretty? Amber shivered on the counter, gulping in great breaths of air. Did he really think this was how a man should express his interest to a woman? Was he going to rape and kill her?

One thing for sure. If she were going to die here, Amber did not want to go meekly into the night. She quietly curled her hands into fists, fighting her rational mind which was screaming at her that she had no chance, not now. But Amber couldn’t die without protest. She began to imagine spinning her body and striking back. She had seen Ricardo practice his martial arts and knew she had no chance, but she was still going to do it.

Two thumbs pushed into the crack of her ass and pushed to the sides, completing the separation Amber had started with her spread legs. A finger pressing on her butthole caused a jolt of panic that shattered her thoughts of attacking.

“You and Neto didn’t have much butt sex?” Ricardo asked in a tone that was not really a question. He was so close, Amber could feel his breath on her anus. It was so bizarre. His voice was so calm, like a doctor’s voice filling out a medical form on her.

“Uh, no, I guess not.” Amber whispered. “Please, Ricardo...”

“How often?” The fingertip was lightly probing the closed ring of exit muscles that was guarding her bowels. Then Ricardo pushed in stiffly, with enough pressure to depress the pad of his finger into the annulus of her outer sphincter. Amber worked mightily to control her panic, trying not to squeeze her anus and push the finger away. Ricardo would interpret that as a direct challenge to his domination of her. Amber grimaced at the thought of her pending rape.

“Answer my question!” he hissed.

Amber blinked. What question? Oh yes. Memories came flooding back, Amber aroused and on all fours, Neto panting in eagerness and lubing his cock before mounting her doggie style and taking her in her ass, fucking down into her bowels until Amber would scream at him to stop. Amber had found the couplings painful and she rarely submitted to the ordeal. She finally answered Ricardo’s question. “Once a month maybe, maybe less.”

“Humph.” He mumbled back, and he then pulled her ass cheeks so far apart it was painful. “Yeah. It looks it. I bet he used lots of lube too. Did Neto have a large cock?”

Amber sucked in a deep breath. “Huh? I guess ... I guess I don’t know.”

Ricardo paused. For the first time, Amber had puzzled him. He would have disciplined her for any defiance, and the current bruise on her butt was nothing compared to what he could raise. But he could hear from the tone of her voice that she was genuinely afraid and trying her best to be honest and speaking in simple truthfulness. Still... “How could you not know?”

Amber trembled. “Neto was the only boyfriend I ever had.”

“That’s impossible!”

“I mean he was the only boyfriend I ever got physical with.”

“Really?”

“It’s true, Ricardo.”

“So he took you as a virgin?”

Amber sighed. “Yes.”

“And you never saw another man’s cock?”

“Not erect, no.”

“But what about the Internet?”

“Oh, I don’t know. There I guess, but I never thought to make comparisons. Please Ricardo, I’m trying to cooperate. Will you let me go?” She grimaced as she felt a tug on her tampon string.

“Depends. When did you start?”

“Butt sex?”

Ricardo started tugging again, almost hard enough to pull the tampon from her vagina. Amber felt a squishiness inside her and thought Ricardo’s manipulations were stimulating her menstrual flow. And in truth her womb was quivering from her terror. Without warning Ricardo slapped her hard on her right butt cheek, so loud it sounded like a pistol shot in the quiet store. Amber was surprised that after the initial sting, there was surprisingly little discomfort. Her adrenalin was suppressing the pain.

“Don’t get smart with me, Amber. Your period.” he whispered the deadly calm voice. Strong fingers pulled on both outer lips of her labia and separated her. Amber guessed Ricardo could probably see the red wet part of her almost saturated tampon, and then she felt the cheeks of his face pushing in and pressing against her thighs. Amber was hit with a wave of revulsion as she realized Ricardo’s head was between her legs. He was smelling her. After a few moments there was also a soft wet touch unlike a finger that was running in a circle around where the tampon entered her vagina. Ricardo was tasting her too.

“Yesterday,” she whispered with a squeak.

The tongue paused for a second. “Are you regular? Do you flow a lot?”

Amber blinked at how bizarre the conversation was, talking to a man whose face was pressed up against her sex and licking her menstrual flow. She could feel him tugging on her tampon to release more of her discharge, and it felt as if he had worked it about halfway out of her vagina. A hand came up between her legs and gripped her hard in the front abdominal area directly over her uterus, compressing and releasing, compressing and releasing. Amber felt her uterus cramp and spasm from the rough stimulation, and she felt like spitting in disgust. Ricardo was pumping her uterus to increase her menstrual flow, and it was probably working.

Amber blinked. She was ignoring his question, and that was extremely dangerous. She tried to calm herself, resigning herself to her fate. “I used to be regular. This cycle my period was two weeks late. Please, Ricardo...” She took a deep breath and added, “Maybe it’s the stress.”

“And?” The simple word was spoken sharply, a quick rebuke of her incomplete answer.

“Huh? Oh! I guess my flow is about normal.”

“Hmmm...” Another pull, and Amber could feel the tampon sliding out of her. There was more lapping, and then the tongue stopped at her urethra opening. Amber sighed and trembled in despair. She could feel what he was doing. He had one hand pressing against the center of her butt. Amber guessed it was holding up the string on the partially extracted tampon. With the high arch she had in her back, her entire genital region was easily accessible. Ricardo had discovered her urine duct.

At first he just probed the slit opening lightly with the tip of his tongue, causing Amber to shiver from the contact on the super sensitive tissue. Then his lips pressed in and he sucked the urethra slit area into his mouth. He began to suckle her.

Amber was almost in tears trying to decide what to do. Was he trying to send her a message? Did Ricardo want her to release her bladder and let him taste her urine? Is that what he wanted? Guessing wrong either way would probably get her killed.

Amber gasped. His tongue was now trying to enter her urethra duct. It wouldn’t fit of course, but the tip of his tongue was pushing in and stretching the end of her duct, and the sensations were that of tiny electric shocks. The suckling and her fear were causing an intense need to urinate, and Amber was horrified to think that she was about to lose control of her bladder. And just how would Ricardo react if she urinated into his vigorously sucking mouth?

Amber whimpered as she fought a rising tide of panic, and then without warning Ricardo released the suction on her pee slit. “Date of birth?” he asked calmly.

Amber almost cried in dismay. There it was again, that surreal feeling of an office exam. Her life was a living nightmare. “February 2^nd, 1999,” she whispered obediently.

The mouth and fingers left her labia and butt, leaving the tampon almost but not quite all the way out of her body. Amber could feel it dangling, the sticky wetness unpleasant against the folds of her labia.

“You’re a groundhog girl?”

“Uh, yeah, I guess.” A timeless period passed as Amber waited for the next insane question or insult against her body. The suspense from waiting caused an almost unbearable urge to urinate, but she bore down on her bladder valve with all the control she had left and kept it closed. And still there was no response from Ricardo. She finally dared to lift up her head and look back.

She was alone. Or at least, she appeared to be alone. Was Ricardo still in the room, watching her from some hidden spot? The man could move like a ghost. Amber fought to keep herself from crying as she completed the removal of her soiled tampon and retrieved a new one from her discarded backpack. A moment later she pulled up her pants.

So many questions, and none on them seemed to have answers. This had been by far her strangest experience yet with Ricardo. Why did he do it? And why did he stop? Did it have anything to do with her birthday? Her period? Games within games, was he really sexually interested in her or just teasing? Or perhaps there was some other motivation, something so completely foreign to normal thinking it would be forever beyond her comprehension. Would she ever understand? With one last fleeting look around the silent store, Amber shivered and headed down the stairs and back towards the Mall.

“Wait,” she thought to herself, “I never got the Bowie knives.” She forced herself to go back and put eight of the gleaming knives in her backpack. She took one last look around the store. A strange place, she decided. It had almost everything for land or river wilderness exploration, but there were no bows or arrows. Uno and his entire group found that extremely frustrating. For all the Mall’s opulence, there wasn’t a projectile weapon or a wheel in sight. Wheels would be incredibly useful for transportation, and Uno had promised her many things if she were the first to find one.