Part II: Once Upon a Handmaid

(May Contain explicit adult material and violence)

Day 12

They had all been holding up rather well in the hotel for two days, taking food from the mini bars and stealing the supplies that they needed from the mall. Amber was sitting in the room she was sharing with Weaver in a very short silk negligee, she normally wouldn’t have chose to lounge around like that but it was summer and they were on the top floor where it was rather hot. She was reading a magazine that was at least a month old wishing that there was some ice to put on her forehead. They had three working generators on the floor, Amber had personally stole one to put in the room and even though there were three fans connected to it the room was still feeling like the fifth layer of hell. Weaver was laying on the bed across from Amber trying to get some sleep but the heat was making that nearly impossible. Suddenly there was a loud noise from out in the hall, Amber dropped her magazine and stood up ready to go investigate. Kerry sat up too but she had no intention of going out there, Amber looked over to her and motioned for her to stay quiet. She grabbed the baseball bat that she was keeping by the door and then slowly opened it stepping out into the hall, she saw a group of what looked like soldiers standing there looking from room to room.

“Hey!” She called to them, one of the guys turned and looked at her with the most pathetic perverted grin plastered across his tired face. She sighed and took some more steps forward to meet them in the hallway, “I am so glad that you…” The man grabbed her by the hair with out warning and slammed her into the nearest wall, she cried out briefly and then fell to the floor in a slight daze. Moments later Monica rushed out into the hall wearing only a towel and holding her gun out in front of her ready to shoot. She didn’t realize that all of the men were already carrying M16s which they all promptly aimed at her.

“Drop it sweetheart, we’re taking over now…is there anyone else here?” The guy who seemed to be in charge asked as he got down by Amber and stroked her face gently. Amber groaned her head was now throbbing and she couldn’t make any move to stop him from touching her.

“Amber?” Weaver looked out into the hall and then saw Amber on the floor, “What the hell is going on here?” She crutched over to McKay and then got down next to her trying to make sure she was going to be okay.

“No we are the only people here.” Monica lied hoping that if she could spare the others they could rescue them, she had heard of this group before they weren’t with the military they were just a group of weirdo’s who had some screwed up idea about the way society should be. They thought that women should be property and only used for breeding while men took over and ruled the world. No one thought much of them before the virus considering that they had no power over anything, but now the world was different and they seemed to have all the weapons. Monica set her gun down slowly, normally she would have tried to use it but she gave that up since there were six men pointing rifles at her.

“Good then you won’t mind if we check the other rooms on this floor.” The man replied, Romano stepped out into the hall also only wearing a towel which got Weaver to wondering what they were actually doing in there.

“Monica?” Romano asked thinking that they were both about to get it on, what he saw was Amber on the floor holding her head in her hands and Weaver next to her, Monica was standing there looking frustrated and a little worried and then he saw the six men with weapons, “Who the hell are you people?”

“Robert I don’t think you should talk to men with guns that way.” Monica muttered as she took a step back so she could be next to him. Kerry decided to ignore the fact that Romano was all of a sudden getting some from a woman who was young enough to be his daughter and turned back to the men in the army uniforms.

“What do you want with us?” Weaver asked then in the calmest voice she could summon, whatever they wanted couldn’t be good, after all they were all carrying guns and the way the men looked at Amber was making her sick to her stomach.

“We want to start a society again but according to our rules.” The leader replied and then motioned for the other guys to check the rest of the rooms.

“What are your rules?” Weaver replied, the only time she had seen guns like that was shortly after 9/11 with the military officers at the airports but at that time the men were not threatening to shoot her so it was okay.

“Basically? Men are in charge and women are for breeding or entertainment…oh yes and taking care of the men.” He said getting down by her grabbing her chin in his large rough hand, “And I don’t like you.”

“Feeling is mutual.” She growled back at him and tore her head away from his grasp, Amber finally looked up her head was still throbbing but she was beginning to become reoriented. A few moments later the soldiers returned with Corday, Greene, Carter, and Abby pushing guns into their backs so they would walk faster, they looked just as confused at the rest of the group.

“You won’t get away with this you know that don’t you?” Monica snapped at them as they pushed their new hostages towards the elevator they came in on. Little did they know that they were in for the worst next few days of their lives.

Day 14

Amber, Monica, Kerry, Elizabeth, and Abby had been separated from the men, they were kept in a very dark room and no one had come in to give them food or water. Amber leaned against Weaver trying to get some sleep, it seemed like they had been in that room forever. Monica was busy pacing in the almost pitch black darkness trying to think of a way to get out of this.

“How do you know about these men?” Corday asked suddenly, she was laying at the floor staring up at the ceiling trying to remain calm and not think about the fact that Mark might already be dead. Monica stopped dead in her tracks and then stepped back so she was against the wall.

“I was an FBI agent and a few years back they were under investigation for harboring illegal weapons. I was one of the agents sent in to infiltrate the group along with another male agent, they decided to hit both sides of the group to make sure some one would talk.” Monica explained and then slid down the wall to the floor, “These men truly believe that the women should be used for sex, that they should take care of the men, and that they should be denied any education. They don’t let the women read or write the penalty for that was a severe beating even though there was talk about cutting hands off. The thing I am most worried about is Kerry.”

“Why me?” She said suddenly snapping to attention Amber groaned and repositioned herself already half asleep.

“Because you’re handicapped…and well they see that as a weakness, they’ll probably wish to execute you unless I can find some way of convincing them that they need you.” Monica replied, it took a moment for that to sink into Amber’s brain but when it did she sat up and looked in the direction of Monica even though she couldn’t see her very well.

“Tell them she’s a doctor.” Amber said, if they thought she was a doctor they might give in and try to use it to their advantage or they might just kill her anyway because women aren’t supposed to be superior to men.

“Well it’s worth a shot, but as for the rest of you I don’t want you telling them that you are all doctors because if they think you are smart they will keep closer tabs on you and if you ever wish to escape you are going to want to play stupid.” Monica explained getting back to her feet to pace around the room again, “And if any of you have any hand to hand combat training or martial arts skills save it till you absolutely need it because once they know you have it they can be prepared, or just kill you.”

“What if they ask us what occupation we had before?” Abby asked biting her nails in substitute for having a cigarette.

“Lie…tell them you were a waitress, Lizzie was a secretary, and Amber was a stripper.”

“Whoa wait a moment there sister,” Amber said to Monica finally getting up from her position of leaning on Weaver’s shoulder, “Why do I have to be the stripper?”

“Over the past few days I’ve observed you and I happen to know that you are very good in the martial arts. Now think about it this way, if they think you used to be a stripper then they are going to think you are stupid which means you can gather information and they won’t pick up on a thing. Also I saw the way they looked at you…I believe you are going to have the most seduction power in this group.” Monica replied like she had this all thought out even days before they were captured, Amber stood up and bent over to stretch she was getting irritated with how long this was taking and was getting ready to punch something.

“Fine whatever.” She agreed, she was quite a smart girl she had even trained to use firearms and was a marksmen. She knew how to take apart and reassemble the M16’s that the group were carrying and if she hide one piece by piece they might have a chance at escaping. The only problem was, what would they do after they left? Where would they go? Were there really any other people left out there that didn’t think they could turn this country into some sort of radical bible camp?

“I know like it seems that I have all the answers here but I also have questions.” Monica replied after a moment of silence, “Can you tell me everything you know about this virus?”

“Before the virus became a massive outbreak I was able to get some lab results on the infected blood.” Weaver spoke up this was definitely news to the rest of the women so they looked in Weaver’s direction with intense interest, “The reason I never got around to telling anyone is because there wasn’t much we could do, in fact we only have a slight idea on what the virus does and what it is but there is probably no chance of a cure of vaccine I didn’t want anyone to panic.”

“Okay what were the results?” Corday said feeling slightly irritated that she wasn’t told more about this when it was actually happened, she was lucky enough to have dodged being infected herself, all of them had close contact with at least one person who was infected.

“Well the virus causes madness, basically it drives people back to their animal instincts. The cause of the virus is the blood of something in the blood.” Weaver tried to explain it was a complicated subject and it was hard enough for her to understand it herself.

“That doesn’t make sense.” Abby snapped, she was just as irritated as Corday was for being kept in the dark about this.

“There is a micro organism in the blood like a living thing, billions of them are in just a tiny drop of the infected blood. Once in the blood stream they reproduce like crazy but the process of traveling through the circulatory system crushes their fragile bodies and it causes them to release their own blood.” Weaver said as she played nervously with her hands. Everyone stayed silent trying to make sense of this, there are micro organisms in the blood that get crushed and bleed releasing a toxin into the system of who ever comes into contact with them.

“How is the disease transmitted?” Monica asked, she had no idea how she had survived a few different attacks by the infected before she realized that she had to start shooting her gun.

“You can only get it if the blood gets into your blood stream. All of us at the hospital saw the infected vomiting up blood, almost constantly. They all had open sores and during an attack if one of them bit you then you got it, if they cut your skin and some of their blood got into yours you got it, and lastly as far as I know if they got close enough to vomit blood on your face. There are a lot of entry points in your face such as your mouth and eyes and if you were to get a tiny bit in either of those areas you were a goner.” Weaver replied softly, Amber took the woman’s shaky hand in hers trying to reassure her that she wasn’t mad about not being told this information in the first place. “It only takes about thirty to forty seconds for the madness to take place.”

“Where did it come from?” Abby asked as she slowly started to stretch her arms out in front of her wondering if they were ever going to get out of this place.

“All we know is it came over from Africa, probably with Luka but I’m sure he didn’t bring it over on purpose, as we all know he was one of the first infected…” Amber said, she did have that much information on what was going on she had gotten a call from the center for disease control, well she was just the one who happened to pick up the phone in the madness of the outbreak. After that there were no more questions, instead they all just sat and waited to meet their fates at the hands of the men who were probably standing outside of the door.

Amber guessed that she must have fallen asleep because the next thing she remembered was waking up when the door to the room opened. She groaned at the sudden light that had spilled across the room and lifted her head from Kerry’s lap. She recognized the man standing in the door, he was the one who had slammed her into the wall back at the hotel, and there were two other men standing behind him. He looked around for a moment and then stepped over to Weaver, he grabbed her arm and pulled her to her feet.

“I’m going to have so much fun with you.” He growled, Weaver struggled to get away from him not sure where she would actually go if she got away, she didn’t have her crutch and that alone was going to severely limit her movements.

“Go to hell!” She yelled at him, but that only made him mad and he backhanded her across the face very hard. Amber cried out and got to her feet ready to pounce on the man for hurting her like that, she looked over at Monica who glared at her, trying to warn her not to launch into her self defense just yet.

“Don’t! Please leave her alone!” Amber pleaded with the man, after that he suddenly lost all interest in Kerry and shoved her back against a wall. Before Amber could even think about going to her he grabbed her wrist and pulled her into a disgustingly long and sloppy kiss. He had his arm tight around her waist so she was pressing up against him, she raised a fist to punch him but he saw her out of the corner of his eye and grabbed her hand.

“If anyone is going to get hit…it’s going to be you.” He replied before punching her as hard as he could in her jaw. She yelled out in pain and she could feel her consciousness slipping away as black spots danced in her line of vision. Her legs went weak and she started to fall to the floor but he wouldn’t let her go, instead he pulled out a small modified tazer and stuck it in her side shocking her with a low volt enough to wake her so she wouldn’t pass out.

“STOP IT!” Weaver screamed wishing she could do more then just sit there she was already dazed from the hit to the face and her head hitting the wall when he pushed her back wasn’t helping any. Corday was crying softly in the corner and she was sitting next to Abby who looked like she was about to be sick. The man held Amber in his arms she was too weak to struggle now and her body wouldn’t listen to any of her commands to escape. He looked back to one of the men behind him and motioned him to come forward, a tall and very handsome man stepped into the room holding a rifle.

“I think it’s that one.” He said in a thick British accent, Corday looked up to see who he was talking about and then he walked over to her. She screamed and tried to back into a corner as much as she could, she knew it wouldn’t help but it would at least give her a few more moments of semi freedom from these radicals, “Will you stop it I’m taking you to see your husband.”

“Mark? He’s alive?” Lizzie whispered before a smile crossed her face, she wiped her tear stained cheeks and stood up before willingly walking out of the room with the man that had just spoken to her. Abby and Monica watched them leave, Monica was worried that she wasn’t going to see Mark that it was just some sort of ploy to get her to calm down. Two other men came into the room and escorted Abby and Monica out, neither of them tried to struggle or escape it was almost as if they were admitting defeat. The man holding Amber in his arms stepped into the room and one of the guards shut the door behind him. He tossed Amber to the floor and started to unzip his pants, Weaver pulled herself into a corner selfishly hoping that he wasn’t going to do anything to her. Amber groaned in pain her whole body felt like it was completely on fire, she was still in the skimpy negligee from the hotel, and now her body was shaking like a leaf.

“If you keep still this won’t hurt…oh and my name is Scott I want to hear you scream it.” He said once his pants were off, he was still in his boxers when he got down on the floor by Amber and shoved her negligee up to gain access to her matching panties. Weaver winced she knew this was something that she didn’t want to see or hear for that matter, but she couldn’t bring herself to speak up and stop it from happening. Scott yanked Amber’s panties down and ran his hand over her smooth tan leg up her thigh and then over her ass, his breathing was hard and it was obvious that he probably hadn’t had a woman in quite some time.

“Why are you doing this to us?” Amber cried softly as she tried to pull herself to a sitting position, she didn’t want to just lay there and take it but her body was telling her otherwise.

“Because we can, there is no government, no law enforcement, and we’ve decided to take control of the women…who’s going to stop us Amber?” Scott retorted cockily, Amber groaned and gave up on her task of trying to sit up, instead she laid still on the cold cement floor waiting for him to fuck her. He slid off his boxers to reveal his rather large and erect member, lucky enough for Kerry he had his back to her. With out warning he slammed into Ambers body and she screamed out it had been a very long time since she had sex with a man and she didn’t like the feeling it was creating. Weaver looked away and then covered her ears so she wouldn’t have to hear the torment that Amber was going through, she couldn’t do much at this point and it was killing her to sit there and wait.

Scott slammed in and out of Amber’s smaller body mercilessly, he didn’t make much noise save for a few animalistic grunts. He reached up and placed his hands on Amber’s breasts and began to massage them roughly, Amber cried out in pain and put her hands on his wrists but it was pointless because she was barely even strong enough to squeeze them. She looked up at the ceiling and started to pray softly her eyes filling with tears almost faster then they could run down the sides of her face. These men had been planning this for years, they were planning on some sort of Armageddon or mass outbreak. They planned on something that was so unlikely but they had prevailed and now there was no stopping them, they had the bombs they had the guns and they had the technology so they now ruled this area of the country.

“Moan bitch…” He grunted before slapping her across the face, she cried out in pain and moaned softly. Weaver didn’t think she could take much more of this it was getting harder and harder to breathe and her eyes were flooded with tears, how was she supposed to accept that the rest of her life was just going to be like this. Scott hit Amber across the face again and she moaned louder and then again, she kept her eyes closed trying to pretend like this wasn’t happening to her. Finally he came, she felt his hot seed spilling inside of her and she cried out in disgust, this was not something she ever wanted to experience again. He pulled away from her and put his pants on, before he left the room he spit in her direction and then slammed the door locking it behind him.

Day 16

The only times that all the women were together was during meals, they were served in a large cafeteria that was in whatever building that they were being held captive in. Corday got to eat with Mark, at least they were somewhat happy because they still had each other. At this particular time Monica was sitting at the table staring at her food she was refusing to eat, and no one could really blame her for that. Abby was picking at her food and Amber was trying very hard not to fall asleep, they weren’t allowed to talk to each other during meals but they had worked out a system of communicating. It had only been a day or two, they had lost count, but they were already formulating a plan to get gun parts and an escape route. Since they couldn’t talk to any of the guys or even Corday it was going to be very hard to get them to cooperate espically since all of the men looked like they had been brainwashed. Weaver and Amber shared a room, at first they couldn’t figure out why the men were letting them share a room, but Weaver soon found out it was because Amber would do anything to keep Kerry from harm. This wasn’t Kerry’s idea, in fact she tried to talk Amber out of it every night but Amber wouldn’t hear of it, instead she continued taking all of Weaver’s punishments and personal sessions with the men. Amber’s droopy eyelids finally closed and she slumped against Kerry’s shoulder in a very light doze before Scott picked up knife and threw it in their direction, Weaver yelped and pushed Amber out of the path that the knife was on.

“Huh?” Amber said looking around completely exhausted from the night before, the men had been keeping her up all hours of the night to perform services for them and she did it to prevent any harm from coming to Kerry. Little did she know that she was just making things worse because no one bothered to take Weaver out of the room when they did their little sex acts with Amber.

“Stay awake he threw a knife at you.” Weaver said to her trying to be quiet about it but she wasn’t quiet enough because some one over heard her.

“That one just spoke!” She was surprised to find that it was Carter who had ratted her out, she bit her lip in anger and in worry wondering what kind of things they had been doing to her fellow co workers over the past few hours. Amber slowly got to her feet and walked over to Scott, she whispered something that no one else seemed to hear before he slapped her across the face.

“Don’t let it happen again.” He snapped at her almost as if she was the one who had spoken, Weaver looked horrified, enough was enough Amber was already incredibly weak she wasn’t going to let them beat on her even more.

“No!” She stood up from her chair, “I’m sick and tired of this!” She had to lean against the table to keep from falling, Amber turned to look at her and her eyes went wide she shook her head trying to warn Kerry to get her to shut up, “She didn’t do anything wrong…I DID…therefore you punish ME!” Scott frowned and looked around the room as Amber started to plead with him not to do anything to her, her cries went unheard and soon he pointed to Romano who was amazingly in a lieutenants uniform, the guy really knew how to kiss ass when he had to. Romano walked over to where Kerry was standing and looked at her, he was obviously very irritated that some one had pulled him away from his dehydrated food.

“I’m going to enjoy this Kerry.” He punched her, and he certainly didn’t hold back on the strength portion of it either. She was caught so off guard that she fell to the floor, she felt dizzy but she didn’t want to pass out. Amber ran over to her and got down by her side pulling her into her lap to check her out, Romano glared at the both of them and went back to his table where he continued eating.

“Get away from her now!” Scott commanded at Amber, Amber had already broken down crying and shaking and wishing that Kerry didn’t have to be such a hard ass all the time. She didn’t move from the spot on the floor next to her lover, she just held her tightly praying as hard as she could that they would get out of this place soon. Scott motioned to Carter and he walked over to her and pulled her away, it took every bit of her strength to not start kicking ass right there, Monica was right she was going to have to wait to do that until they really needed it.

“I’ll take care of her.” He said as he pulled Amber towards the door, she gave up on her fighting about half way across the room wondering what the point was. He got her into the hall were there were still guards stationed so she couldn’t talk to him he shoved her hard and she fell to the floor with a quiet grunt. He then stepped up next to her and pulled her up by her hair and told her to stop being so stupid before shoving her into one of the many empty bedrooms that lined the hallway. He locked the door behind him and then shoved her onto one of the beds, the last thing she wanted was to be raped by some one that she had worked with for a few years.

“Look, John…” She started to plead before he could start whatever terrible punishment he was going to inflict on her. He sighed loudly and sat down on the bed next to her he was seemingly back to the Carter she had known before.

“I’m not going to hurt you, it looked like you needed a break.” He said laying back on the bed and folding his hands under the back of his head, “How’s Abby is she okay?” Amber’s lower lip trembled and she started to cry again but this time it was tears of joy and relief she laid next to him and wrapped her arms around him.

“Oh god John.” She whispered snuggling up to him she was so unbelievably happy that he hadn’t bought into the crap they were probably trying to brainwash him with. He moved and put his arms around her holding her tightly it was nice to be able to finally speak to one of the women. “I’ve only seen her a few different times but she’s healthy.”

“That’s good…we have about 45 minutes in here before they start getting suspicious why don’t you try and get some sleep.” He said running his hand through her in a calming manner, he had no sexual interest in her whatsoever but he did want to comfort her, they were friends after all.

“Will you stay here with me?” She whispered as she rested her head on his chest, he nodded and started to rub her back softly, “Have you ever read the book ‘The Handmaid’s Tale’ by Margaret Atwood?” She whispered as she felt her eyes begin to close.

“Yeah probably in tenth grade or something.” He replied reaching behind her to pull a blanket over the both of them.

“I never thought there could be people like that in this world.” She muttered as she let her eyes shut, he didn’t have a response to that but he definitely agreed with her. He sighed softly and pulled her into his arms more before drifting off into a light doze himself.

End Of Part II