Hard Push

Macao, a former Portuguese colony clinging to the coast of China had always been a haven for gambling, indeed the colony's wealth along with shipping exports were still the chief sources of revenue.  After reverting to Chinese control, the new landlord had prudently decided to turn a blind eye and let the revenue stream continue to flow. Communism and the people’s revolution after all still needed money to finance it and what before means than the foreign imperialist dogs that still flocked to it.  As long as things stay close enough in hand the authorities let things slide all in the name of a more modern open China. 

The once seedy and tumbling down gaming houses had been replaced by more luxury Western style casinos and hotels complete with bright neon and flashing lights.  To entice people in and keep them inside both North American and European high rollers could expect red carpet treatment during their stay.  Of course, not all the seedy establishments had disappeared they’d merely relocated if necessary or having been so far off the main street in the first place they’d lucky avoided the forced sale of their establishments and by a strange twist of fate had actually seen their profits increase as the local inhabitants, so long barred from their businesses now flooded in simply because they were now barred from the newer ones. 

The games of chance were all the same, sometimes just as honest, sometimes not.  Women and men wandered the floor looking for a wealthy patron or if they were fortunate a newly wealthy person who was in or could be convinced to be in, a giving mood and private rooms were just steps away! 

It was the rainy season, day and night of torrential steamy muggy rain fell in sheets and it seemed to her that all of Macao was indoors with most of them crammed in here to dance and gamble!  Elegantly dressed and coifed she was definitely out of place, both in dress and age.  Her body hugging gold lame dress cut and styled to give her form its maximum appeal stood out from the low riding jeans and tank topped patrons of this very young crowd most if not all of whom she was old enough to be the mother of, made her standout even more.  She held her small handbag above her head with both hands and started to pick her way through the gyrating mass of bodies detouring as required like a chess piece knight. 

She’d barely made any progress when a young girl, maybe sixteen, wearing a flesh toned fishnet bodysuit started to dance with her and her progress ground to a halt.  She tried to side step her uninvited partner but the girl was persistent in her attempts at blocking her by bumping and rubbing up against her in no accidental way!  The woman gave up and gave in her body starting to move to the pulsating beat.  The strobe lights banged off and on dancing beams off her dress as the two moved to the pounding beat. 

She felt the other at her back but by then it was too late!  The woman continued to dance, but now she had two partners to deal with!  She moved quickly and expertly, deflecting away their sudden steps and hand movements!  Her hands useless above her head were quickly taken by her two young foes, locked in theirs and held aloft!  Even her fingers were fused to theirs in a complex pattern of finger knots.  Luckily her experienced legs were proving more than a match for that of her young foes, as they did with most people, her best and deadliest asset evened the tide for now! 

The beat changed and as if on cue the girls picked up the pace with a smile as did the woman keeping the battle even.  She knew she had to free her arms but the girls were very good and her maneuvering room within the crush of people hampered her efforts.  They moved around the floor for more than half an hour in the silent battle the other dancers completely unaware of what was going on around them. 

The deadly dance entered its second half-hour her body still resisting her much younger combatants.  She danced one leg back and forth between the two her calf muscles tensed and wet with the effort.  The woman blocked and blocked again all the toying girls had to offer.  She tried her arms again, but the girls still had them, a set of flesh coloured and sheer black body suited arms had them and worse her purse, the repository of some of her weapons, was positioned so she couldn’t get at it! 

The woman blocked a high knee lift aimed at her stomach, swept her leg back to block one from behind but was a fraction of a second late!  The heel of her shoe landed on the mid thigh of the girl at her back creating a natural arch in her leg for a fraction of a second before she could pull it away!  

Her frontal partner exploited the mistake to perfection as her leg slipped into the arch locking the woman’s one leg off the ground and ending the woman’s hopes! Mrs. Hawthorne’s free resting leg was slowly raised up and crossed over her trapped leg at her hips!  Her dancing partners then forced her first trapped leg slowly up her torso, pulling her crossed leg back and around her side sealing her off the floor and into their bodies! 

The girls danced the captive older woman about the floor as she struggled to free herself.  Slowly they worked themselves about her drawing ever inward as their hungry bodies devoured hers in an orgy of twisting twinning flesh.  She resisted with all she had and waited for her chance that she knew would come.  The two young dancers, after more than an hour completed their hold and moved the woman off the dance floor slowly and against a dark recessed corner of the casino.  They squirmed against her for a few minutes clearly enjoying the feel of her delicious body against their thin outfits. 

‘You trapped in Vietnamese Twisting Vine! Mrs. Hawthorne! My name Trang and partner Troung,’ said Trang. 

Mrs. Hawthorne’s chance at long last had finally come Trang was mere inches from her face.  The captured woman smiled and wiggled seductively holding Trang with her eyes as their lips touched!  Trang was tentatively and then enveloped hers in a long passionate kiss!  Mrs. Hawthorne rolled her lips luxuriantly over Trang’s bathing the young woman in her lipstick making sure it bit deep into her dance partner to have the desired effect. 

She smiled as she released the girl’s lips knowing the effects from her poisonous lipstick would be felt in seconds! 

‘We prepared for you Mrs. Hawthorne.  Our lips coated in protective sealant!  Your lipstick have no effect on us!’  Trang smiled. ‘We also hear your legs both beautiful and deadly, but ours deadlier.  We also told you like to use poisonous lotions on legs, again we take measure!  Our clothes let skin breathe but not let in moisture.  You out of tricks Mrs. Hawthorne!’ Troung soothed and sealed the statement with a kiss to the woman’s neck. 

The woman so sure her poisonous touch would free her entangled body attacked again her lips stinging Trang’s in a bid to break the sealant, constant moistening exhausted her lipstick and her chances, Trang was still alive! 

‘Lipstick gone Mrs. Hawthorne and so your chance for escape,’ Trang smiled as she pulled away. 

Trang and Troung adjusted her for another amount of time her dress clearly not giving them the grip they desired, but still enough to hold her at their pleasure.  Troung reached over and pushed a concealed button, the girls leaned against the wall, it gave way and the trio slipped from sight.  The wall returned to its place without anyone knowing. 

’Welcome Mrs. Hawthorne!’ a woman she knew all too well said.  ‘A welcome and a goodbye all in the same night!’ 

‘Still afraid to face me one on one Mrs. Yin?’ Mrs. Hawthorne said defiantly. 

‘Why should I my dear woman when I have such capable help?’  Yang Yin said as she came up close to the entwined woman before undoing the straps and removing Mrs. Hawthorne’s shoes then handing them to an associate. 

’You’re such a resourceful woman, who knows where your weapons may be hidden,’ Yang smiled as she proceeded to remove the woman’s rings, earrings, bracelets and finally her purse before stepping back to take in the full picture of the trapped woman. 

‘It’s amusing, at least to me, that every time, be it COIL or you think they have me I manage to turn the tables on them.  Claire Baxter thought she blew me up on that island in Singapore and here you thought you’d tracked me down through your intelligence network and come here tonight to kill me only to have the tables turned on you!  But enough of that we both have work to do, mine of a profitable nature and yours of a dying nature.  This room,’ Yang said waving her hand about.  ‘Is completely sound proofed so your screams of pain will fall on deaf ears, excepted that is for Trang and Troung’s!’

As if on cue the girls squeezed Mrs. Hawthorne just a little.

‘Goodbye my dear I have business to complete this evening and I wouldn’t want to deny you any further playtime with my girls!’  A final victorious smile and Mrs. Yin and her associate left with the processions they’d removed from Mrs. Hawthorne. 

Trang and Troung were almost a third of their captive’s 45 years of age.  They were close to her in height, but thin, wiry and strong.  Trang was fatally beautiful, Mrs. Hawthorne guessed Troung was probably the same in terms of looks. 

Trang smiled at Mrs. Hawthorne whose body squirmed seductively in the girl’s grip hoping her charms and naturally alluring nature would aid her as she probed for possible escape routes.  The Twisting Vine was applied slowly to all victims, but the girls worked extra slowly and carefully on their dangerous prey.  Mrs. Yin had told them about the older woman’s deadly wiles so they took their time as they probed her body for the perfect position to start the Twisting Vine, one from which she would never escape! 

Mrs. Hawthorne’s body was fighting them all the way; her curves and muscles challenging their technique as they worked.  She had no intention of dying in these young one’s death trap, no matter how erotic it was!  Her body stalemated them time and time again as they held her upright and worked into her with youthful energy.  The older woman worked her body against theirs using all her wiles to delay the coiling of her form.  Her sweating body was producing a heavenly aroma and she was wet with arousal from their touch, which she knew was part of their plan of attack!  An orgasm would seal her fate quickly so she fought for control of her body and mastered it denying the girl’s a quick solution. 

‘I can play that game as well!’ she thought.  Mrs. Hawthorne lured Trang to her lips again and worked her skills to loosen the one girls grip! She succeeded, mesmerising her young foe enough to gain some measure of freedom but only for a few minutes.  Troung picked up the slack for her occupied partner and soon the woman was right back where she had started. 

The pillared woman worked her body again as the girls clinging forms progressed slowly about hers.  Their lethal young curves eagerly exploring and exploiting her weakening body as they slithered and slipped about her carefully applying their technique!  The twin columns of creeping twinning flesh slowly proceed about Mrs. Hawthorne, her body unable to pull free from these deadly nymphs! 

‘You very flexible Mrs. Hawthorne and body a pleasing to the touch!’ Trang offered. 

The woman smiled sarcastically as she worked her helpless body against theirs in endless vain escape attempts.  The girls pulled closer with each passing minute drawing the woman inward to her doom in a softly effective embrace of death!  The girls followed their orders to the letter giving the woman a slow painful death!  After several hours, her body had resisted all it could, slick with sweat and damp with her writhing she couldn’t get it to fight any longer.  She went limp in their trap and girls took up the slack with a fierce inward snap of their bodies! 

Mrs. Hawthorne came alive with pain and screamed in agony as a torrent of suffering ripped through her! 

‘Ordeal just being for you Mrs. Hawthorne,’ Troung giggled in delight.  ‘Soon you get see my face and give me kiss!’ 

Carefully the two began to move, twisting their captured prey in opposite directions at the waist!  Mrs. Hawthorne moaned and struggled for air, her diaphragm behind pushed up and constricted as she, the vine, was slowly being twisted to death, but she endured and saw Troung very beautiful face two hours later and got her promised kiss! 

‘No poison lipstick Mrs. Hawthorne, but kiss just as deadly!’ Troung smiled and laughed. 

‘You haven’t won yet I’m still alive!’ she answered weakly. 

The deadly duo resumed the vine but Mrs. Hawthorne wouldn’t submit without a fight, she surged her hips and caught the surprised duo, the three over balanced and fell to the ground! 

‘Nothing change Mrs. Hawthorne you still trapped in vine!’ Trang said. 

Indeed, the girls still had her totally enveloped and near fatally twisted to death, but the fall had freed one of her fingers and she slowly touched it to the palm of her hand just as the girls turned and twinned her for the final time!  They’re final time! 

The long encoiled woman gulped air and freedom as she lay between her foes, free at last from their Twisting Vine.  Superbly conditioned Mrs. Hawthorne recovered quickly from her ordeal, sat up, rolled over on to her knees to look down on Trang and Troung. 

‘You beat my lipstick and my body lotion, but you didn’t anticipate my dress! Did you girls?’ she said as she softly stroked Trang and Troung’s heads.  ‘All I needed to do was activate it and to do that I needed to free a finger to touch the remote hidden trigger under a false layer of skin on the palm of my hand.  You see the dress is equipped with hundreds of tiny needles all tipped with a deadly nerve poison. The needles eject from the dress and inject their venom in a thirtieth of a second before returning.  I took the antidote before I came here tonight and I’m sorry girls I don’t have any extra to offer you!’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne got to her feet and walked slowly over to the door Mrs. Yin had gone through.  

She recovered her purse, shoes and jewellery.  After fixing her makeup and hair as best she could the woman walked back to her former dance partners and placed a death card, her picture, on each one. 

She slipped out the door the Trang and Troung had brought her in so many hours ago, to die. 

‘The nights not been a complete waste!’ she thought.  ‘I killed two DOOM agents and learned a valuable piece of information!  Once I gather more intelligence on this COIL agent Claire Baxter and track her down I’m going to make her tell me all she knows about Yang Yin one way or another.  I don’t like unfinished business!’ 

^^^

Copenhagen had yielded nothing except the discovery of a lovely teahouse that she’d become accustomed to visiting every afternoon for the past week.  She comforted herself in a pot of Darjeeling Tea and mentally began to re-evaluate her intelligence sources. 

‘Darjeeling Tea and the afternoon sun to enjoy it in.  Life is good sometimes isn’t it Mrs. Hawthorne?  May I?’ Claire said as she motioned to the vacant seat. 

‘I hear you’ve been looking quite keenly for me all over Copenhagen.  I must tell you I find
that very flattering and a little disconcerting.’ 

’In what way?’ the woman answered. 

’Flattering given your reputation and disconcerting for the same!’ Claire smiled. 

’I have no designs on you my dear I merely wanted to ask you a few questions regarding a certain matter I’m involved in at the moment.  Why don’t we go back to my hotel and we can discuss it privately away from prying ears and inquisitive eyes?’ Mrs. Hawthorne suggested. 

’Yes, we should do that!’ Claire smiled.  ‘Once in your lair you can entangle me in your Negligee or question me in your Totem!  Given the choice I’ll take ears and eyes!’ 

’As you wish, but I can assure you my intentions are honourable,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said calmly as she slid her hand slowly down her leg and pushed a button underneath the heel of her crossed leg!  She moved her leg rapidly forward towards Claire. 

The spy took a sip of tea and smiled as the sole of her shoe blocked Mrs. Hawthorne’s drugged needle and pushed it back into its hidden compartment. 

’Titanium plate in my shoe,’ Claire offered.  ‘Now you were saying your intentions were honourable?’ 

’An amateurish attempt on my part,’ the woman said as a way of apology.  ‘Do try one of these watercress sandwiches, they are divine!’   Mrs. Hawthorne picked up and offered the plate to Claire. 

’Tell you what I’ll order my own lunch and you can eat the poisoned ones from that plate!  And don’t give me the shocked and surprised face I know you deposited a few minute traces of poison on them from your pantyhose when you slipped your hand down your leg on your first clumsy attempt on me!  When you’re ready you can cut the crap and we can get down to business or I can leave the next time you try something stupid like that!’ 

‘Both were truth sermons!  Since we both fight the people on the other side of the fence I had no intention of killing you.  But again, I apologise for my lack of trust, but it seems to be a habit that is growing in nature with me,’ Mrs. Hawthorne offered. 

’It’s a common trait in this business. Don’t apologise for it, just refine it so you know who and who not to trust and it can serve as a valuable tool in the future.  It may, however, interest you to know I came here to answer your questions regarding Mrs. Yin.  Yes, Mrs. Hawthorne, I do know more about you and so does COIL than you think.  You’ve been a bit of a pain in the ass to COIL in the last little while!’ Claire stated flatly. 

‘I take it you don’t share C.O.I.L.'s opinion?’ Mrs. Hawthorne said with a raised eyebrow having picked up the not so hidden meaning in Claire’s statement. 

The COIL agent took a long slow sip of tea while she eyed the woman across the small table from her.  Claire had been watching this most intriguing woman for the past several days, trying to size her up and get a feel for her so she had something going into this encounter.  Most female agents were finished by age 40 but this self-taught one was just getting started at 45 and Claire could see why! 

Mrs. Hawthorne dripped sex appeal and allurement from every pore of her well-toned and conditioned body.  The pictures Claire had taken and the ones from the Dossier COIL had provided cemented her reputation as a woman of class, substance and above all style.’ 

‘Legs women half her age wished for were always on display.  Her large breasts always tastefully covered in silk blouses or revealed in sexy evening gowns.  Her hair, dark was constantly teased and set to flutter hearts and her lips drew you to them.  Add to that package, flexibility, stamina, inventiveness and a liberal sexual nature, a necessary attribute in this business and Mrs. Hawthorne was a very deadly woman!’ 

‘What my employers think and what I think don’t always mesh,’ Claire slyly stated.

‘And would these be one of those times?’ the older woman smiled back as she stirred her tea. 

Claire pondered the woman before speaking although in truth she already knew what she was going to say, she’d decided that several days ago.

‘Part of our job is to gather intelligence on DOOM, either through overt or covert means, both involve risk and most times the information you gather can be used in a pre-emptive way to stop DOOM operations before they begin or prior to it going critical.  Most times the risk can be justified by the reward, even if that means the death of agent, but not at the present time and my employer does not seem to understand that!  Mrs. Hawthorne your talking to one of only 40 female COIL agents left out of over 150 less than 2 months ago, and yet COIL continues to risk us to gather intelligence that may cost us our lives!  My view is that intelligence is great but we need to even the odds a little and that means terminating as many DOOM agents and conspirators as is possible until we can better balance the scales and we have all the intel we need for that!’ 

‘And where do I fit into all this?’ the older woman asked not relaying the astonishing admission from Claire nor her shock at it. 

’COIL found out you were looking for me.  They picked up your trail in Macao and traced you here.  They told me you wanted information from me and that you were to be considered a threat that needed to be dealt with!  They sent me to deal with that threat!’ Claire voiced in a calm tone, as she looked the woman squarely in the eyes. 

Mrs. Hawthorne took another sip of her tea not quite sure of her next, or Claire’s next move.

This young woman was hard to read and she wasn’t used to that.  She decided to leave knowing COIL would not want to make a public scene or worse yet have her cause one.  She uncrossed her legs and shifted just the slightest in her chair when Claire spoke again. 

’Before you leave and I know tea’s not the most appropriate drink for it but let me offer this toast.  

Here’s to me enemy’s enemy may she live a long life!  Claire smiled saluting Mrs. Hawthorne with her teacup.  ‘As I said my employer and I don’t see eye to eye but I think you and I and a certain number of my colleagues do!  Please don’t leave just yet there’s several other things I want to say to you if I may?’ 

The woman shifted back in her seat as Claire refilled her cup and Mrs. Hawthorne’s. 

They took a few sips each before Claire began again not sure how what she was about to say would be received, but like all things of that nature it needed to be said so she began. 

’I met your husband twice, once in Atlanta at the CDC and again in Stockholm for the Nobel Prizes. I want you to know how sorry I am about what happened and how you must feel.’ 

 ‘I’ve heard that so many times from so many people and none of them has any clue how I felt, still feel about it!’ 

’Like if you’re living in a shadowland of memories and images.  You can see, feel, taste, smell and touch all that the two of you ever experienced together but its missing something to make it whole.  You search and you search for it, running from room to room in your mind certain you know where it is and if you just will it hard enough you’ll find it and make it whole again!  You see it, reach out your hand and close around it only to open your hand and find it’s not there and then you remember again where it is and the search starts all over.  It’s like putting on his old sweater and smelling his scent all around you, the memories flood back, but not him and sooner than you think the sweater becomes a source of pain but you can seem to part with it because that pain would be greater than not having it at all so you keep it and torture yourself!  You lie awake in bed and remember the last time you made love and while you’re thinking of it your hand slides down between your legs and you imagine him there, how he used to touch and caress you.  Then you feel what you’re doing to yourself and you’re ashamed so you no longer think of that time again.  Slowly all the memories fade, but the pain and loneliness remain and soon that’s all that’s left.’ 

’Joseph and I only knew each other a short while and only saw each other in fits and snatches.  He was killed on assignment and I nearly quit in despair and you know something I too me everlasting shame I let the despair get so deep inside me that I can’t recall anything about the last time we made love!  Is that about right Mrs. Hawthorne?’ Claire said defiantly. 

’I’d love to find the bastards that killed the man I love and kill them oh so painfully, paying them back for all the pain they caused me!’ she continued with water on her eyes.  ‘But that’s not bringing him back and it’s not going to bring back the memories either, they didn’t do that to me!  I did it to myself and I have to live with the fact that in my own way I killed Joseph as much than they did.  They took his life, but I erased his memories through my bitterness!’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne said nothing, which Claire interpreted as an apology. 

‘Now to the second thing I wanted to tell you.  DOOM is not amused with you, as I’m sure you have guessed by now!  So far you’ve done the picking and choosing of the targets but I can tell you the game is about to change or has perhaps Macao already taught you that Mrs. Hawthorne?’ Claire questioned with more than a hint of knowledge. 

The older woman was unfazed by all this but was still curious at the chance to gather more intelligence especially if it was being offered without her having to coax it out.  ‘Please do go on,’ was all she said. 

‘You fell into Mrs. Yin’s trap and if the girls had been more experienced we wouldn’t be having this very pleasant chat.  Yet you managed to escape and kill both of them in the process, my congratulations!’ Claire said. 

‘Yes, I did!’ the older woman challenged. 

‘This time!  As I said the girls were young, novices in their trade, with just slightly more training they would have known to strip you naked thus rendering you helpless, but the luck of the draw was with you as it has been with me many times.  The people and consequently the perils awaiting you now are a whole new level! I hope you’re prepared for it?’ Claire warned. 

‘I have been so far but perhaps I need some more expert training?’ she questioned looking at Claire with a cat who swallowed the canary smile. 

‘As tempting an offer as that is I have my own troubles and admirers at the present and mixing them, you and me together would not be a good plan.  I have enough trouble keeping myself alive I don’t need to add you to the mix!  Besides, I both think we’re happier being solo hunters given our natures.’ Claire answered.  ‘About Mrs. Yin, she’s sexy, sly and slippery!  She can be beaten, but you usually have to go through her minions to get to her and even then, unless you make sure she’s dead you can never be sure.  The last time I saw her she was wrapped in my friends Obi Sash in a Shimoi Knot and left to die, but as you can attest to she’s still alive, that doesn’t surprise me!’ the spy answered before sliding a memory stick across the small table to Mrs. Hawthorne.   ‘You’ll find all my data and C.O.I.L.'s as well on her.’ 

‘Thank you very much, for everything Miss Baxter I’ll put it to go use, but you know I still could use a session or two if I need to be at my best as you say?’ Mrs. Hawthorne wooed with her voice, eyes and lips.  She could see Claire weakening to her will so she pressed.  ‘I’m staying in the penthouse of the Hammarskjold if you change your mind and I hardly ever go out.’ 

‘As tempting an offer as that is perhaps I can tempt you with something else, but first, this conversion has been decidedly one way on nature and I don’t mind that, I wouldn’t have been as forthcoming if I didn’t want to.’

‘And what would that temptation be my dear,’ Mrs. Hawthorne asked.

‘First tell me what you know of me and what you think about what I do,’ Claire responded.

Mrs. Hawthorne pondered the question for a few moments.  She was certain this young lady, young enough to be her daughter, had she any children, was not looking for compliments or praise.  No, this was deeper, there was something else behind that question.  She was still thinking when Claire spoke again.

‘I know you know or still know Catherine Wycliffe and that it was she you turned to when your husband was killed.  You knew each other from university, had maintained that friendship and I suspect she had on several occasions either tried to recruit you or as I suspect actually used you as an agent.  One does not acquire the unique skills each of us has merely by taking a few defense classes or Yoga sessions.  You move with a practiced eye Mrs. Hawthorne, an eye I’ve seen before, Catherine taught you well.  I wonder just how many more of you there are out there.  She had the right idea, she just didn’t know how to use it properly,’ Claire explained.

‘And you do?’ came the immediate counter.

‘I take it from your lack of denial that I’m recalling my facts from the hacked file I have correctly.  Oh, that’s included on that stick as well,’ Claire answered. 

‘I suppose it’s my turn now,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said.  ‘Truth is I know very little about you.  I know things like your education, your drive and then ethereal things one picks up in the circles we run in.  You’re a DOOM nemesis it seems, a prize they covet yet can never seem to win and it appears to be costing them which only makes them want to collect it more no more if the value of the prize is less than what their willing to spend to get it.  What I can tell you just from this brief encounter is that you’re a hard woman to read Claire Baxter, but that when you give your heart is totally given, you’re all in, as they say, you believe in the cause, I’m not sure you always thought that way before.  You’ve been a good, well decidedly so, and excellent agent, a good foot soldier, but I suspect that’s not so much so any longer, given your rather rigid comments about COIL at little earlier.’

The ball was back in Claire’s court, this was the hard part for her, trust and this woman made it harder given her background and the entanglements, albeit, one the fringes of COIL, but like she did in so many instances on mission she decided to leap confident in her ability of come out a winner.

‘I have one other person in my life I trust completely I would like to make that two.  What you surmise is true, a testament to your skills.  COIL likes to do things a certain way, operates a certain way, thinks a certain way.  To them the end justifies the means, because the beginning is always the same.  Let me explain it this way. Pretty girls are a dime a dozen. Pretty girls who are also smart are a quarter a dozen.  Pretty girls who are smart and athletic are 50 cents a dozen. Pretty girls who are smart, athletic and trainable are a dollar a dozen. Problem is every year there are lots of those girls so the cost never really seems that great, you can always replace them, they’re a tool to do a job, only these are people not a tool you replace if it breaks and think nothing more of.  These agents that get cranked out the end of the training program are all true believers, as was I. We get sent on missions that no way in hell we should ever come back from and most don’t, they die for nothing, most of my classmates are dead, some didn’t last a year, but not to worry here come this year’s models to replace them and then year after year more of the same shiny new models.  I went on a mission for parts to something that the best brains in the world can’t figure out how it fits together and I suspect they knew that all along, but sent me anyway just to say they acquired them.  What they didn’t tell me, but I found out, curtesy of my clandestine hacking was that ten other agents had tried and failed before me.  Ten women killed for nothing!  When I found that out the Kool-Aid didn’t taste as good anymore,’ Claire explained.

‘That was the choice you made going in my dear and you somewhere in the recesses of your mind knew that, you can’t claim innocents or shock now.  That is why I decided when I embarked on this new career path not to become part of COIL or any other organisation.  I have my own means and the financial security to make it happen for me, that’s one part.  The other is I don’t have to take orders from other people, dance to their tune or do their bidding,’ she smiled.

‘That’s true and for the record I wasn’t complaining.  But I have friends I can call on if I need help, you don’t and the people coming for you are relentless.  You’ve jumped into the deep end Mrs. Hawthorne and although a resourceful and skilled woman your about to be pulled under and there’s no one to whom you can turn for help to ensure you finish what you started.’ Claire countered.

‘Except of course you,’ the older woman answered.

‘No, together.  What would be the sense of the former, that’s the same system I exist in now.  I have no intention of living the very existence of the definition of insanity.’ Claire said then did something that surprised them both.  She reached across and took one of the woman’s hands in hers and continued

‘I would never knowing send or put an agent in harms risk, that has to be their choice and even then, I might decide otherwise.  But I also need women who are ruthless, as General Sherman said “War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want." 

Mrs. Hawthorne went back to her hotel room her mind still turning over the day’s events, it having not gone at all according to her plan.  She had hoped to lure Claire back to her place and seduce her then extract the Intel she wanted, but her two clumsy efforts at the café had been easily repelled leading her wonder if an attempt, even on her tuft would have proven any more successful.  For the first time in a long while her mind entertained doubts about her skills.

The spy had proven to be all she had expected, beautiful, intelligent and skilled, but then there were the things see hadn’t expected, the offer to help her and the rest than true believer, she had to told was Claire Baxter.

‘And then there’s this,’ she said opening her hand to revel a second memory stick Claire had somehow managed to place in her hand although Mrs. Hawthorne had no idea where she extracted it from to get it there.  ‘She needs to add magician to her resume,’ the woman added as she plugged the stick into her tablet and watched it flair to life. 

‘You can call this the unofficial part of our visit.  On here you will find what I think you need personally to accomplish your goal.  As I said you’re good, but you need to be better, these people will you help achieve that.  They’re all expecting you, the invitation is open at each location, stay as long as you want and learn as much as you can from each of them.  These people are not associated with COIL in any way nor will they tell me anything about you if you chose to use their services. 

Detailed instructions on how to find them are included, just use the hyperlinks to access the information.  Right now, you’re probably asking why is this woman with the reputation I have, deserved believe me, doing this?  I cannot go into any detail regarding that at the present time, unfortunately you’ll have to do the one thing you and I have trouble with, trust.  Also on here are safe houses, should you need them, again, there off the COIL grid.  Also, a list of contacts, should you need supplies of the kind only a spy would need.  Just take what you need, don’t stand on ceremony.  

The final two things:  My personal unofficial contact information, should you need help and where I can post messages that may aid you in your search or if you just want to talk we can do that through the portal imbedded.  The last is a place to meet me at if you wish and a time and date specified.  If you do not that is fine and I will understand, but I hope you will.  Astra inclinant, sed non obligant.’

The woman brushed the corner of an eye, blinked and then began to move through the information still unsure of what was happening or what this young woman was up to but in some small but growing way sensing she could trust her.  

^^^

‘You’re pushing us awfully hard,’ Claire thought as she glanced around the conference room at the other agents assembled, while new missions were being passed out by Paige who was if possible looking more stunning than before.  Catherine had told her that her class training was going extremely well, but Claire noted with reluctance, that Paige was still more than a year away from being an active agent, maybe longer.  ‘That is a long time to hang on,’ she sighed to herself as she flipped the pagers of her latest mission pretending to pay attention.

She looked over at Charlotte Thorne, who was busy making a few notes.  Charlotte was the oldest active agent in the room at 26, then Claire at 24, Maoko, her cover blown with the Poison Geisha, was also 24, then a passel at 23, Irina Propova, Helen Yates, Sigrid Hertler, Yasmin Rodriguez, Ming Lao and Tran Phuong, all young newly minted and eager.  Claire wondered how many would be here in another month.  This was just one group out of these but the demographics were about the same for each group Claire knew. She made a few mental notes as the meeting broke up, one on one’s would happen later in the day.  Claire headed for the gym, she needed to work off some stress.

^^^

‘G ’day Claire, you’re looking a little tired,’ Charlotte said as she stepped onto the Elliptical next to Claire’s.

‘Those small talk skills still the envy of all,’ Claire smiled.

‘Remember you’re talking to a girl from beyond the black stump, we tend to be short and blunt in our conversation,’ Charlotte said the second half of it switching back to a refined Australian accent.

‘Seriously, your mission count is far too high.  Last I checked you’re triple everyone else and growing.’

‘You mean the last time you snooped.  It’s not a competition you know, I take them because they are there and I’m not one for sitting around much,’ Claire answered.

‘Never was for me, I plan to stay alive and enjoy my retirement, maybe you have other plans, but you best start keeping those to yourself,’ Charlotte barbed, and it was meant to be.

Claire switched off her machine and then reached over and did the same to Charlotte’s.  ‘Mind explaining that!’ she said her voice sharp and stern.

‘You want to be super spy, good for you, you go and be that, but do those young girls in there a favour and do it out of their sight.  That’s the last thing this organisation needs are more Claire Baxter’s!  You’re not immortal, that’s evident more and more, even when I point it out to you, you just ignore it.  Well fine, but ignore it at your own peril and not imperil others with it.  Those girls need guidance, not a whirling out of control top crashing about, that will just get them killed.  Their young and scared, they look to us old girls, if you will, for help, I try to give it, you, well, you might as well just hand out death certificates to them, because that’s all you can give them,’ Charlotte countered.

Claire’s temper was up and Charlotte could tell.

‘Oh, and don’t think about starting something Claire, you know I’ve every bit the agent you are!’

Claire did know that to be true.  Charlotte Thorne was just that, only she was cautious where Claire was reckless, knew her limits where Claire pushed hers ever outward, Charlotte calculated the odds Claire gambled.

‘Ever wonder why you’ve never been called into do some training or been a mentor, because you can’t teach what you are and frankly I’m sure COIL wants you to try,’ Charlotte added stingingly.

   

‘Maybe they should, seems the ranks are getting a little thin around here,’ she snapped back and started up her machine again.

They both finished their workouts in silence.

^^^

‘You are a remarkable student Mrs. Hawthorne.  I confess I had my doubts when you showed up.  Bit too much weight, limited flexibility, but you proved me wrong.  I can see that 18 hours a day training has not been wasted.  Claire was right about you,’ Pei said.

‘What did she say if that’s not betraying a confidence,’ Mrs. Hawthorne asked the monk. 

‘She said you’d ask that.  I think you know the answer without having to ask.  What you rediscovered about yourself you also discovered about Claire.  You two are a great deal alike.  You had best be going if you are to keep to your schedule.  I do however have a graduation gift for you.

‘A Glock 26,’ the spy said astonishment in her voice.

‘Martial Arts only goes so far, it cannot stop a bullet and this road is dangerous, best to be over prepared,’ she smiled and tucked it into her backpack along with two spare clips then gave her latest student a big hug and a kiss on the cheek.

Mrs. Hawthorne hitched up her backpack and started down the road toward India, her version of the journey to the Buddha’s homeland.  

^^^

‘You can go right in Miss Baxter he’s expecting you.’

Claire thanked the woman and turn the handle one of the large doors,

‘What the fuck!’

‘See what did I tell you, you owe me a dollar.  The same classy woman you knew back then, hasn’t changed a bit,’ Benjamin Steinmetz laughed as he came around the desk and gave Claire a kiss on her cheek.

‘Look don’t be upset come and get reacquainted with old friends,’ he said taking her arm.

‘You know what you are,’ she whispered to him.’

‘Yes, and I’m been called worse.’

Claire walked over as the elderly man and women stood up slowly.  Claire just looked at them not knowing what to say and they the same.  She gave a kiss to the man’s cheek and took one of the woman’s hands in hers.

‘It never did straighten all the way out, did it?’ she said before hugging her.

‘It’s as you said Ben, impossible as it seems. I thought you were having us on, but it’s true,’ Sam Carroll said just as Claire swept him up in a hug of his own.

‘How can I explain,’ Claire began before Millicent cut her off.

‘Ben already explained everything to us,’ she stated.

‘Did he explain to you that it’s classified information as well,’ Claire said looking at him.

‘So, sue me,’ he said with a wave of his hand and that great smile.

‘Who are we going to tell who would believe us, especially at our age?  They’d think we’d gone around the bend,’ Sam said.

What questions they did have Claire filled them in on, but she was the one with all the questions for them which happened over lunch and dinner and a long goodbye.

‘This is a bad way to end the evening but we have to say it don’t we Sam,’ Millicent said as he nodded back.

‘You look tired, you’ve still got that spring but it’s not as high as it used to be,’ Sam said concerned.

‘That was a long time ago, memories are tricky things,’ Claire answered.

‘Not of you,’ Millicent answered. ‘Please Claire, we lost you once, we don’t want to lose you again.’

^^^

She could not believe how great she felt.  In fact, she could never remember feeling this good, even in her youth.  She could run a marathon a day at high altitude and then walk for hours on end after that.  Her walk to India had seemed daunting when she first looked on the map but it had turned out to be anything but.  She stayed in small inns along the way or people’s homes, her stay at the monastery allowing her to pick up the language to smooth communications on the road.  Now she crossed the last Tibetan range and head down to the border and the Indian town of Mana 24 km inside India and then finally onto Badrinath and the Ashram. 

^^^

‘Everything is going along smoothly and slowly so as to not arouse any suspicion,’ Ben said.

‘Good,’ Claire said studying a reef of papers on the desk in the boardroom, all to do with her holdings and financial position.  ‘We are doing very well so far this year, looks like its heading for another record,’ she smiled as she looked up.

‘I agree.  How did it go last night?’ he asked.

‘Wonderful.  Thanks for doing that, I know I was upset at the start, but it took a great longing weight off me and I thank you for that,’ she said smiling at him.

‘I tell you, that smile alone was worth the anxiety I had about the whole affair.  This however is another matter,’ he said sliding a piece of paper across the desk.  ‘We need more exposure in South East Asia so we bought into two banks, one in Thailand and the other in Myanmar, both are mainly commercial with what I can best describe as loose business practices,’ Ben explained.

‘I hope we’re clearing that up,’ she answered.

‘No just yet, it’s precisely that matter as to why we bought them.  Take a look on page 7, I hi-lighted a few records.  Now take a look at this,’ he said picking up the remote and hitting several buttons. On the smart board at the front up popped the highlighted data from the paper.

‘When we back and forwarded traced these transactions look what come up,’ he said advancing the program

‘These are DOOM fronted companies, untouchable, protected by powerful interest groups,’ Claire said.

‘Yes, but they also appear to be clearing houses for paying certain employees who do not seem to be normal employees, recognise a few of the names,’ Ben added.

‘You put the data I give you to good use,’ Claire said.

‘Helps having a son with a Masters in Computer Science, he built the database,’ Ben smiled.

Claire studied everything in silence for a few minutes then asked.  ‘Why are the cash dispersals these companies are making later each month?’

‘My question exactly, something is going.  I have my son looking into this this all under the cover of normal business acquisition activity, you know, looking at the books, but signing confidentiality waivers, as if that means anything now a day,’ he said with a trademark waive of his hand.  ‘It’s slow going as you can imagine, but we’ll get there,’ he added.

‘Keep me informed on this.  I have to go away for a while, but if anything comes up just call me,’ she said.

They reviewed more documents relating to her vast empire, all concealed so perfectly by legal twists and turns so perfectly that no one knew except Ben, his family and Claire and one other person who she trusted completely.

‘I miss those hugs, don’t get enough of them,’ he smiled. ‘See to it I great more Claire, be careful and safe.  I say this for me, because I know you won’t listen,’ Ben said giving her one last one before she left.

^^^

Mrs. Hawthorne rang the gong softly at the gate and waited.  The door opened giving her bit of a start as she never heard the women approaching on the gravel path on the other side.

‘Hello Mrs. Hawthorne. I’m Laxmi, Claire said you would be coming soon.  How is my favourite student?’ she inquired.

Mrs. Hawthorne had been in almost daily contact with Claire since their initial meeting.  She had initiated the back and forth and Claire had true to her word been there for her.  What had started out as just a kind of update or report on what she was doing had grown into much, much more than that.  Claire seemed to welcome even encourage it as did she.  Soon she began missing a Skype call or an email if it went more than day without one.  She also started to notice a change in Claire, but never said anything, just skirted around the issue by suggesting other things, almost motherly advice, which Claire seemed to take well.

‘She seems a little, well, off her time, if you follow,’ Mrs. Hawthorne reported.

‘She’s pushing herself too hard again.  She did that when a student here, I constantly had to correct her to find a balance as I’m sure I will have to do with you from time to time, although,’ Laxmi answered before stopping and looking then placing her hands about Mrs. Hawthorne’s body feeling her Chakra Points.  Maybe not so much, you are remarkable well-balanced Mrs. Hawthorne.  Have you studied before?’

‘Just a very little, nothing serious,’ she said modestly.

‘A humble student is an empty vessel,’ Laxmi smiled indicating that was good.  ‘Yoga is of the mind and body, the two work as one,’ she explained as they continued walking. ‘There is only one mind, but there are many bodies, each compete against the other for dominance, the mind must learn to order the body, teach it that each has a part to play in the whole and being a non-dominate part is just as if not more important in the overall mastery of things.  I start all my students with the basics of Yoga, then we move on from there at a pace you set.  Yoga is a constant journey Mrs. Hawthorne, there is never an end, always something else to master, that is the joy of it,’ she explained.

‘What types do you teach?’ she asked.

‘Anusara, Ashtanga, Bikram, Hatha, Iyengar, Kripalu, Kundalini, Sivananda, Viniyoga and Yin. Incorporated they embrace all the Chakra Points and keep you in balance.  Once you have master these we can move onto more exotic forms of yoga,’ Laxmi explained.

The Ashram was laid out in a ‘U’ shape.  Door all around the compound, some numbered, and some named.  The Kitchen, meals are made and taken here communally, a list of your duties and times is in your room which is this way she said as they walked along the covered veranda.  This is our studio where we will be when not working or sleeping and this is your room, it’s simple but comfortable and don’t take any nonsense from this fellow,’ Laxmi said bending down and letting the Mongoose scamper up her arm and onto her shoulder. ‘Ollie is the latest protector of this Ashram, his ancestors have been our companions since it was founded, but he’s a lazy fellow, aren’t you Ollie,’ she said giving him a scratch on his chin. ‘But when called upon, he’s always there, perhaps that’s why you’re so lazy, the cobra’s all know your reputation and stay away.  Anyway, don’t let him mooch too much from you, all he really wants is a little attention,’ she said lowering her body and letting him run off.  ‘I’ll leave you to get settled in then we can begin,’ she smiled and left.

A quick scan of the activity sheet told her she was on kitchen duty that night.  She reported dutifully and along with two other women, whose English was not very good and her Urdu just as bad, made Idli for the next day’s morning meal.  After several hours, she reported Laxmi’s studio and then began her formal training.

Sixteen hours a day training, then chores about the Ashram left little time for anything else, yet even in those few spare minutes she could find Mrs. Hawthorne did more yoga.  She became immersed in it.  She found the quest to push her body further and further, to master the mind and channel it a lover she could not get enough of.  

Her body lethal before was transformed into a something incredible, it firmed up even more, sculpted itself, toned but still feminine and even more seductive, it flowed like a snake but was hard as steel.

‘I’ve had many students over the years, but you my dear are my star. You’ve mastered so much that its time we move on to more, exotic forms of yoga.  I want you to learn as many contrasting styles as possible,’ Laxmi said as Mrs. Hawthorne curled into a Sirsa Padasana pose and stilled.

‘You have the rare ability to flow and strike in your yoga, trained, as I said with the more exotic styles you’re before a weapon hard to defeat.  I think you will be even better than Claire.’

Mrs. Hawthorne flowed smoothly from the Sirsa Padasana to the Taraksvasana, the Handstand Scorpion

‘If you decide to pursue this area I must tell you that they are intimate in nature, with both sexes, I have a male master for you to work with.’ Laxmi explained.

‘And the female,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said with a smile as she raised her lower legs up and opened them a little.

‘That will be me, I trust no one else, but although the styles are erotic and sexual by nature, we are not lovers Mrs. Hawthorne, we are teacher and student, same goes for your male teacher, is that clearly understood.’ Laxmi said forcefully leaving no room for error in what see meant.

‘Clear,’ the spy answered.

Laxmi crawled silently toward her student’s legs contacting her shoulders and neck, Mrs. Hawthorne’s toes softly stroking her neck before they slipped around each side of her neck.  She deftly undid the pin on her one shoulder holding her Saree together and watched it fall away.  Her legs slithered down and crossed over each over the soft pads of her toes finding and feathering Laxmi’s nipples.

Slowly she pulled Laxmi to her lips for a soft kiss.

‘What happened to teacher and student?’ Mrs. Hawthorne said as their lips parted.

‘There are always exceptions,’ Laxmi answered.

^^^

Mrs. Hawthorne returned from her duties in the Ashram, this time she was on laundry duty.  Ollie seemed to have taken a liking to her and spent his time in the laundry as well, but only when she was on duty.  They made their way back to her room long after dark when Ollie popped out in front of her, fur exited in all directions, his voice excited for only an instant before he pounced into the darkness and reappeared several seconds later a dead cobra in his jaws.  

‘Enjoy your meal,’ she said as he scampered off silently.  ‘Oh, to be that fast and that deadly,’ she added before going into her room and finding a present, a book with a note. This will serve as your introduction to what we talked about.  Review it and we will talk tomorrow,' Laxmi added.

The Monsoons had come that night, Ollie had returned to her room and slept up on a bench just by the doorway guarding it and listening.  He made rounds under the cover of the veranda but always returned to her room, each time providing a break in concentration from her reading until she fell asleep the book still in her hands.  

When she met Laxmi in her studio the next day she introduced to Anish, who would be her male instructor, Mrs. Hawthorne thoroughly approved.  

‘Do not get too excited, Anish is just one of many male opponents I have lined up for you, as it will be for the female ones as well.  Too much of the same will breed a lay response as you will know the triggers, this way you must use your instincts and other talents to find out what works.  I and the texts will teach you the forms and styles, Anish and others will give you the practical application,’ Laxmi smiled. 

At this Anish excused himself leaving the two women to begin, Laxmi opened the book to the overview and began to explain. 

					Yoga Styles
	Insect					Reptile
Venomous		Non-Venomous			Venomous		Non-Venomous
Centipede		Grasshopper			Snake		Snake
Mantis		Damselfly			Lizard		Chameleon
Wasp		Beetle
		Butterfly
		Moth
		Cricket
		Cicada

	Amphibian					Arachnid
Venomous		Non-Venomous			Venomous		Non-Venomous
Frog		Frog			Spider		Solifugae
Toad		Toad			Scorpion
Salamander		Salamander

Mrs. Hawthorne reach back and hit accept on her tablet.

‘I see things are shaping up nicely,’ Claire said as her screen displayed the nude inverted form of Mrs. Hawthorne, who came out of her handstand slowly folding herself into a Lotus as she picked up the tablet and smiled.

‘Yoga seems to agree with you.  Laxmi tells me of all the people she’s taught you’re the best,’ Claire said.

‘I thought you weren’t going to be checking up on me?’ Mrs. Hawthorne said with a smile.

‘I can’t help it if she emails me her excitement. It would be rude to not to acknowledge her,’ Claire teased back.  ‘Seriously she says you’re a very rare student, one that can do striking and flowing forms as well as combine the two.  Speaking of combine, how are you doing with that?’ Claire smiled knowingly.

‘You young girls obsessed with sex,’ she answered with a laugh, something she did more and more frequently on her calls with Claire.  Their relationship had morphed over time from what Mrs. Hawthorne had originally was someone just hoping to recruit her into something more.  She could never confirm quite confirm it, at least not yet, but a mother/daughter relationship at started to manifest itself, she initially thought Claire needed it so she did her best but soon found out it fulfilled something in her as well and once she had accepted that it took off.

‘I will admit that having different opponents, of either sex, was at the beginning rather stimulating, that time quickly past.  The sexual component was reduced from one of pleasure to several other factors.  Namely, how to escape, how to stimulate and how to adjust said pleasure so it has maximum devastating effect on your opponent.  It becomes more technical, yes, the pleasure is still there but very much in the background.  Now if we’re speaking of after the lesson is over.’

‘Now who’s obsessed with sex,’ Claire jump in, unwilling to let that last remake pass.

‘Touché.’

‘What’s this one’s name?’ Claire said as a furry face filled the screen.

‘This is Ollie and for some reason, he loves my room and me.  Maybe it’s because I give him treats and scratch his tummy,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said as Ollie rolled over on his back for a good scratching and was then off in a frenzy of sniffing and exploring.  

‘We had Monty, I taught him how to salute,’ Claire said with a laugh.

‘Where are you off to now,’ Mrs. Hawthorne asked.  ‘I have to say I think C.O.I.L. is pushing you awfully hard, so many missions, one right after the other, I worry.’

‘I’ll be fine mom,’ Claire said changing the tone at the last minute to make it sound like she meant it to come out as a mock statement rather than the Freudian slip it really was.  She picked up the conversation again adding a second layer to the masking of the mistake.  ‘Honestly, I don’t know why I share these with you, some spy I am, can’t keep a secret.  I just send you an email, at least it’s encrypted of my last mission, this was a little out of the ordinary and that’s saying something.’

‘You can’t keep any secrets from mommy,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said.

‘I have a few small missions, Copenhagen, Minsk and Istanbul after that I want to invite you to the Manilla.  Well Catherine and I want to and no, before you think it we are not trying to recruit you, just a vacation with friends, what do you say.

‘I’m progressing well here, but I don’t want to rush anything, so really I can’t commit much as I’d like to,’ Mrs. Hawthorne explained.

‘Of course, this won’t be for at least 4 to 5 months and if we need to extend it further outward we will,’ Claire replied.  ‘I love these talks, but I have to go and pack and pick up a few things from the office before I leave.  I will call again when I’m settled tomorrow.  I love you Mrs. H,’ Claire said as she pressed a finger to the screen and Mrs. Hawthorne did and said the same.

‘4 to 5 months is a long way off.  My Claire needs a rest badly,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said then caught herself using the possessive.  She opened the email, decrypted the file and began reading, Claire’s narrative storytelling always exciting, she codenamed this one:

Lights, Camera, Claire

‘You want me to do what!?’ Claire said hoping she hadn’t heard right the first time, but knowing she had.

‘We want you to..’  Catherine Wycliffe began before Claire held up her hand.

‘An actress in a bondage movie! Me! You’ve got to be joking!’

‘It’s not like you haven’t any experience in being tied up and unable to move your body!’ Catherine said as a wry smile crossed her lips before she continued.  ‘Besides I wouldn’t really call it a bondage movie, it’s more like a Perils of Pauline, or in this case Claire, type of film.  Look, we suspect DOOM has been using this as a front to smuggle in their agents and information from around the world by importing supposed actress who are in actual fact DOOM agents to star in the films.  We need you on the inside to confirm our hypothesis and terminate the operation.’

Claire knew she wasn’t being asked to do this, she was being told, but in an asking kind of way, but that didn’t make it any better, unless.  ‘What kind of perils would I be involved in?  I mean in the movie of course,’ she questioned hoping the pause between her two statements wasn’t too obvious.

Catherine smiled to herself, Claire was on board, she slid the thumb drive across the table.  ‘Here’s a copy of the script, you’ll be playing the part of Rose Lafleur, a singer in a saloon.  The story, if you can call it that,’ Catherine grimaced.  ‘Is set during the Klondike Gold Rush and well I don’t want to give away the whole thing.  Take it home and read it over and be on the early flight to Los Angeles in the morning.  A representative, a Mr. Sebastian Devilliers, from his film company, will meet you at airport.’

‘You already sent them my picture and phoney bio to get me the part, didn’t you?’ Claire said. 

‘As Head of Women’s operations, you were my first choice.  Besides as your manager I get 10% of your fee and a small percentage of the gross video sales,’ Catherine grinned widely.

Claire rolled her eyes and smiled, picked up the memory stick and left the briefing room.  She sped along in the bright summer sunshine, the top down on her Porsche 911 to take full advantage of the day’s offering.  Twisting and turning she guided the car through the maze of other cars towards her apartment.  It promised to be a beautiful day, a day she had wanted to spend outside and yet every few minutes she caught herself glancing down at her purse with the memory stick inside.   She got home a little faster than usual and made her way to her apartment.

She opened her laptop, inserted the drive and accessed the script.  The movie was called Snow Bound.  ‘God, I hope it gets better than this, but somehow I doubt it!’ she said in exasperation.

From what she could gather the story was just an excuse to set up a series of death traps that for some reason the heroine seemed to constantly end up in.  Her character Rose had a love interest, a Mountie of course, his name was Sargent Rod Steele and he seemed to be always arriving in just the nick of time to save her from certain doom.   She read the script over committing to memory as much of it as she could before starting to pack.

Claire spotted the sign held high above the man’s head right away as she exited customs.  Underneath it was Sebastian Devilliers a short round man with a waxed handlebar moustache, jet-black hair with too much hair gel in it.  He was maybe in his mid-forties which coincidentally so was his waistline and slightly over six feet tall, he was dressed head to toe in black.

‘Good morning Mr. Devilliers I’m Lisa Williams,’ she said enthusiastically using her cover identity.

‘It certainly is a good morning now, considerably better than just a few minutes ago. I must say your publicity stills don’t do you justice Lisa,’ he said his voice positively gushing.  ‘You really should consider having them redone.  If you wish I can contact a friend of mine.’

Claire went to answer but failed to get a word in as Sebastian continued.

‘Pick up your bag and let’s be on our way.   I’ll take you by the studio and then to your hotel.’ 

Claire hoisted her bag and followed him out the concourse doors and into the massive parking lot. 

Claire knew Los Angeles well enough to know they weren’t heading to anywhere near Hollywood.  A thirty-minute drive later they swung off the highway and into a large industrial area.  They passed massive single-story manufacturing plants until one rose up ahead of them that dwarfed all the others!

‘Here we are,’ Sebastian said as he swung in to the enormous abandoned parking lot and up a plain grey steel safety door the type seen on all factories.  ‘Come on inside, this is our studio!’ he said rolling out of the car as he spoke.

Claire passed through the steel door he thoughtfully held open and into the factory which indeed a small portion had been turned into a set.

‘This is our sound stage.  It may not be Hollywood but it sure is cheap and effective for our purposes.  We have virtually unlimited storage space for other sets so we can shoot multiple scenes by just moving the camera.  No tear down set up for us.  It used to be an old aircraft manufacturing plant, covers over two acres, I bought it for a song after all the government money for military contracts dried up and the company went bankrupt.  What do you think Lisa?’

‘It certainly is big and impressive can I look at some of the other sets while we’re here.  Hearing you talk so masterfully about it has me kind of curious?’ she said.

‘I’m afraid there’s no time for that today my dear!  I have other business I need to attend and you need to get some rest we start tomorrow at 6 AM sharp!’ he said with just a bit of an edge to his voice as he took her arm and escorted her out the door to his car.  The two only drove a short distance before the car turned into a place she had hoped it would past, the Hi-Way Motel.

‘Rooms by the hour,’ she thought along the all the assorted jokes she’d ever heard about cheesy hotels.

‘I’ve already checked you in.  Follow me and I’ll introduce you to your roommate and co-star,’ he said cheerily.

‘Great, sharing a room!  This just gets better and better!’ Claire thought as she trudged after him.

A sharp knock on the door revealed Claire’s co-star.  ‘Tiffany Wells meet Lisa Williams and vice versa.’

The two exchanged pleasantries as Claire stepped into the room and placed her bag on her bed.  Mr. Devilliers offered some small talk and reminded the two that he’d be by in the morning to pick them up before he finally left.

‘The guy can talk and stare forever,’ Tiffany said as she flopped on the bed next to Claire’s.  ‘But I think he’s harmless besides that.  Besides he is a big wheel in the genre so it can’t hurt to advertise yourself every time he’s around, that’s why I’m wearing my bikini, that and it’s a sunny day so I can work some more on my tan.   Say mind if I ask you a question?  You look a little refined to be making a movie like this!  What’s your story?’

Claire noticed Tiffany hadn’t waited for her to say it was ok to ask a question before she did.  ‘I studied acting in college and hoped, you know, to come to Hollywood and be discovered.  It’s been several years and I haven’t been discovered yet.  I was tired of waitressing and my agent was tired of me so she offered me this or nothing.  I took it I’m past being too proud to say no!  So here I am.  And you?’ Claire asked back.

‘Pretty much the same story except for the college and agent part,’ Tiffany added.

Tiffany Wells was a tall, strikingly tanned blonde. Long contoured legs, with rounded calves and muscular thighs that flexed as she moved.  A flat workout hard stomach, full, ample rounded and firm breasts that giggled just a touch when she moved.  Her shoulder length hair was pulled back and tied up.

‘About the only thing this place has going for it is its pool.  I’m on my way over there now if you care to join me?’

‘No that’s ok I really need to get some rest,’ Claire said regretfully but in reality, happy to be alone for a while.  She watched Tiffany’s tight round ass bounce out of their room. ‘She’s not so bad let’s see what tomorrow’s like?’

The got up at 5 AM, were picked up at 5:30 and on the set as promised by 6.  Sebastian the owner also turned out to be Sebastian the director as he strode onto the sound stage, riding crop under one arm that he pointed here and there issuing commands as he did to various people.   Dressed in black as usual only this time with a cape and beret he approached Claire.

‘We’re going to shoot scene 21 first, don’t be nervous, everything will go fine,’ he assured her while walking Claire to the change room.

She appeared a short time later and made for the set all eyes upon her or to be more specific her costume.  A silk bodice with the classic tie strings up the back, cut low in the front and pushed up forcing her breasts up and nearly out the outfit.  A pair of sheer black stockings with a seam up the back drew the attention of every male she pasted her long willowy legs dancing by them.  A pair of old style button up boots to just above the ankle completed the outfit.

‘You look stunning Lisa,’ Sebastian said starring at her.  ‘A real femme fatale if ever I’ve seen one!’

Claire deferred comment instead she just smiled as a stagehand motioned for her to follow him. 

‘Attention everyone this is the scene where Rose is suspended over a vat of boiling molasses and as the gears on the waterwheel turn they automatically lower her to certain doom.  Just in the nick of time Sgt. Rod Steele breaks in, struggles with the villain then rescues Rose at the last possible second.’  Sebastian said to all assembled.

The set was designed to resemble a giant gristmill of olden days.  Gears and levels covered the wall behind her, as did the giant water wheel, all contrived of course and not to believable but passable.  No one looked at the background in these types of movies anyway!

They did several run throughs before he was satisfied with the results.  Claire’s part consisted largely of screaming for help and then falling into the arms of her lover who she had to admit was not hard to look at.  One thing did seriously disturb her!

‘What is in that vat and more importantly why is it boiling,’ she questioned.

‘Nothing to worry about my dear that is merely a harmless chemical reaction.  In fact, the liquid is room temperature it’s just the reaction that makes it appear to be boiling.  Remember this is Hollywood!’ Sebastian said.

Claire smiled reassuringly as her wrists were tied together and placed in the grappling hook above.  She was raised slowly off the ground and swung out directly above the vat maybe four feet above it.

‘Ok everyone let’s do this in one take,’ Sebastian yelled.  ‘Action’

‘Since you will not become my bride nobody shall have you,’ the actor playing the villain cackled as he pulled a prop lever and Claire aka Rose Lafleur began to sink to her doom screaming and crying on queue.

Just then Sgt Rod Steele of the Mounties burst in and a back and forth fight started to ensue complete with chairs being broken over backs.

Slowly it dawned on Claire that she was being lowered faster than before, much faster!  At this rate, she’d be inside the tank within a minute.  Her mind raced. ‘Was it a malfunction or were they on to her already one thing was certain she wasn’t going into the vat no matter what she was told it was!

At the last second, she splayed her legs out at 90-degree angles to each other each heel of her boot just catching the rim of the vat!  She slipped her hands from the grappling hook and strained her body with all she had to hold her position.

‘Sir,’ said the cameraman

‘I know keep filming she’s incredible isn’t she what a film it’s going to make,’ Sebastian said.

Claire’s long legs tensed gloriously every sinew and fibre animated beneath the stockings as she held on.  Slowly she lowered her torso stretched out her arms and closed her palms around the lip of the circular vat.  She pulled her body along and then tantalisingly she manoeuvred it into a handstand.  

One long luscious leg raised up followed by the other which for added effect she snaked up the other in an overtly sexual caress until it straightened above her head.  She held the position for several seconds then back flipped off the lip to the floor.

‘Cut!’ Sebastian yelled.

‘A little fucking late wouldn’t you say!’ Claire screamed.  ‘What the hell are you trying to do, kill me?’

‘You could have just fallen into the vat its harmless Lisa, I told you that!’ he answered.

‘Sure, just like the whole scene was timed to perfection!’ she retorted.

He immediately changed the subject having no response that was believable at the moment. 

‘Your improvisation was an act of genius, much better than the script,’ he stammered trying to mollify her.

‘Glad I could aid in the creation of cinematic history,’ she said in an exasperated tone as she walked off the set to her dressing room.

‘Do you have any doubts now my love,’ Tiffany said as she sidled up to her husband.

None at all my pet, no actress or spy in the world could improvise her way out of that death trap, except one’ Sebastian answered.  ‘Are you prepared.’

‘Always my love,’ Tiffany hissed as she walked toward the dressing room they shared.

‘Hazards of the job and a cheap production Lisa,’ Tiffany offered sitting down next to her.  ‘On the plus side, you really are quite incredible, that was quick thinking and if the truth be told it did make the shot much better!’

‘Thanks, but I’d prefer to follow the script and not have to improvise my way through the entire movie,’ she answered.

Tiffany picked up her perfume and casually sprayed a few pumps of the mist into her hair.

  

‘Confidentially,’ she said leaning over close to Claire.  ‘I think you’re a little too stiff to be in this kind of production!’  She leaned back and smiled seeing that Claire didn’t react she smiled even more. 

 ‘Evidently you are too stiff, especially after inhaling my perfume, it quite a paralysing effect unless one takes the antidote!’ Tiffany smiled into the large mirror, before blowing a bubble with her gum, indicating to Claire the antidote she had been chewing.

‘There’s just one final thing I need to do,’ the woman said as she stood up.  Claire felt the knife edged Karate chop and then nothing as blackness swirled around her and then took over.

Her eyes flicked open several times before her senses could properly register.  She felt the back of her neck trying but failing to rub out the soreness from Tiffany’s blow.

‘I trust you are not in two bad a shape Miss Baxter!  We still have a movie to make,’ came Sebastian’s voice from somewhere.

For the first-time Claire took note of her surroundings, a large octagonal room 40 feet from corner to corner with each of the eight sides having a door.  She could not see the speaker or the camera she was sure was filming her.

‘I think this will make a much more interesting firm than Snow Bound and with a much better title.  I’m calling it The Death of Claire Baxter.  I’m already taking advanced orders from many of your enemies.  But I digress; let me explain exactly how my movie unfolds for my star.  Through each one of these doors, you can pick anyone you want, lies a peril, survive it and you get to pick another door and so on until you either escape or die.  Personally, I’m hoping for the latter although given your reputation I’m not betting against the former!  To the situation at hand, your somewhere within the studio complex, the part I wouldn’t let you see yesterday.  You may be near an exit or you may be a long way from it, you’ll never know, you just have to use your skills at survival and have a little luck on your side to win.’

‘Of course, each set is a specific time or place an appropriate costume will be provided for each one to add to the flavour of the film.  What do you say are you ready to begin?’

‘What if I don’t want to play along with this sick game and just sit here?’ she snapped.

‘Oh, don’t be a temperamental star already because then I’ll be forced to flood the room with poison gas!’

Claire had expected nothing less.  She had no choice but to play his game.  ‘Ok I’ll play but on one condition.  My name goes above the credits on the film!’

‘That’s my star!  Let’s begin.  Action!’ Sebastian said.

Claire made her choice moved to the door opened it and walked through! 

She stared into the deep blackness of the chamber her eyes searching the impenetrable darkness for any clue as to what lay ahead.  She refused the temptation to shift her feet in the slightest, who knew what trap may lie imbedded in the floor, just waiting for a merest pressure to set it off, she would make her captors come to her, if they wanted a movie of her death, she wasn’t going to be the only one to play the game!

‘One so beautiful should never be hidden by the darkness,’ Sebastian’s voice wafted out of the stygian night sending a chill down her spine, as his words seem to come from everywhere and nowhere at the same moment!

A single column of light then materialised from the ceiling off in the distance.  ‘Please step into the light Miss Baxter and we can begin filming, time is money you know,’ he laughed evilly.

Claire walked toward the light without any fear of reprisal, she knew they wanted an action shot of her caught and struggling in some diabolical death trap and somehow walking didn’t seem to fit the bill.  At the centre of the beam on the floor lay a neatly folded black piece of clothing Claire new intimately, her catsuit or at least a reasonable good copy of it.

‘You will need this for the upcoming scene Claire, please change,’ Sebastian smirked before yelling. 

‘Action.’

Claire reached behind her and began the laborious process of untying her bodice when the entire set went dark again for only a few seconds but that was all the time needed to trap the spy in her gilded cage!  Circular Stainless-steel bars several inches think encircled her from floor to ceiling about every six inches leaving her only enough room to turn around within its confines!  Claire removed her loose bodice and tossed it outside the confines of her prison into the outer void.  Removing her boots and stockings would however not be so easy as the spy couldn’t bend over giving her the one option they clearly wanted to capture on film.  She had no choice but to play along, besides it gave her the chance to loosen up her body for the ordeal she knew was coming.

Slowly Claire pulled her leg up until her thigh touched her stomach.  She curved her hands down her calf until they slipped in place and locked around the ball of her foot.  With the grace of a ballerina she pulled, bent and lifted her lower leg straight up above her head resting it against a steel bar.  She pumped her torso inward a few times drawing it close to her raised leg feeling herself relax as she did then she undid and slipped of her boot.

Seductively she swept her hands down the contours of her black stocking until she came to the elastic band on her tensed thigh.  Turning over the seam Claire slowly and deliberately rolled the sheer black material down her upturned leg until she reached her ankle.  She slipped the material over her heel bent forward pressing her torso tight against her body and tossed the discarded material into the night.  Rotating her hips, she twisted and bent to repeat the procedure to free her other leg from the material.  She rolled it down just as sexily as the first slipped it off, cupped her hands behind her heel and flexed her entire body to magnificence within her cage.

‘Please put on the suit Miss Baxter,’ Sebastian’s voice said in a non-too-sure tone, Claire clearly hearing the sexual tension as he spoke.

The spy, her naked form still stretched out picked up the suit and fitted it about her leg cautiously guiding the clinging material into place.  She rotated her hips and fitted her raised leg into its second skin then lowered it to the ground slithering the material about her hips she inserted her arms then partially zipped up the front leaving it open just enough to display her straining décolletage.  The catsuit closed around her sealing itself about her yet still allowing her maximum freedom to move her pliant form if need be.

 I’m ready whenever you are!’ Claire stated into the black.

 Just as the last note of her statement echoed the entire octagonal chamber was lit up chasing the darkness away in seconds.  Claire shaded her eyes for a few seconds until they adjusted to their new environment.

‘Then we shall begin your demise Miss Baxter,’ he hissed his voice carrying the trademark maniacal laugh at the end.

The caged spy watched as the ceiling of the entire death trap setting came alive with activity!  Panels slid back allowing metal poles to probe downward to the floor, each stopping at various distances from it.  Claire’s body tensed and her heart skipped a beat or six as she looked through the safety of the steel bars at her predicament.  Attached at the ends of each pole were large oval like cutting blades exactly like those found on chainsaws!

‘Yes Claire, the cutting edge, so to speak, in technology.  Whisper quite when in operation, deadly in application and,’ he paused then threw a switch.  ‘Well you can see the rest!’

Claire could indeed!  Some poles swung back and forth, others side to side and still others spun in place on a swivel creating a circumference of cutting death.  To add their already insidious nature the poles moved up and down as well!  The entire room had become a network of swing and swirling pendulum like death!

‘All you have to do Claire is negotiate your way to one of the eight doors to escape!’ he laughed softly at first before it built into an uncontrollable crazed scream of sadistic delight!  Try not to end up on the cutting room floor Claire!’ he chortled uncontrollably as the steel bars receded releasing her to her doom!

‘Ok Claire, stay calm try and analyse if there’s a pattern to the action of the blades!’ she said to herself just as one silently whizzed by her head.  ‘Guess not!’  She wasted no time picked her direction and started to move towards the door.

She swerved left, pirouetted and twisted narrowly missing an oncoming blade.  Her eyes had to be everywhere and anywhere all at once as she turned about herself in a tight circle locating the cutting death before making another move.  Claire darted forward, only to be forced to retreat as a myriad of whirring death closed about her.  She cartwheeled sideways, tumbled forward, somersaulted backward, but still could make no progress toward her goal, the door and temporary freedom!

She spun again, her eyes focusing just in time to see three approaching blades coming right at her about two feet apart each and less than a foot off the ground!  She let her legs slide out at 90 degrees to each other putting her in the split position, thrusting her torso forward she flattened her body to the ground as they pasted just above her prone form the air from the cutting death blanketing her body sending chills throughout it!  Recovering she pushed her body up as another went by, swept her legs forward and up executing a perfect handstand as two more swung by!  She turned on her hands, missed another two, she splayed her legs apart to avoid a spin saw that pasted perilously close to her inner thighs!  She pulled them together, rolled her body up and tumbled forward springing to her feet, executing a walk over too narrowly miss two onrushing saws as they past silently between her slightly staggered legs!  A nimble jump to a handstand rollover got her a little closer but not close enough as the effort was starting to take effect!

Claire was sheened in sweat, damp to the touch, her chest heaving as her lungs gulped oxygen hungrily!  She was getting tired, slowing down and coming dangerously close to making an error in judgement and she wasn’t going to be afforded a second chance!

A plethora of contortions and gymnastic bending got her a little closer but the effort far outweighed the gain, she was still a way away from her door!  As her chest heaved luridly up and down she knew she was running out of time, options and most importantly energy, she needed to be faster or make the saws slower!

She danced around an on-rushing blade unzipping the catsuit as she went and rocking it off her shoulders as she moved.  Her freed breasts spilled forward from their prison as did her arms as she slipped, curved and bent herself away from the cutting death around her!  The half-naked spy tucked her body and rolled forward several times in a tight ball to avoid the endless onslaught removing the remaining vestiges of her catsuit as she did, she sprang to her feet clutching the former second skin in one hand! She found the seam pulled and tore the fabric in two equal pieces, each in one palm.

‘Now for the hard part!’ she told herself as she dashed forward snapping an end of the material around the base off an advancing pole just above the blades and pulled as she fell forward missing yet another saw!  A sharp yank pulled the swing death scythe off its trajectory and into the jaws of its spinning cousin.  Grinding and twisting metal sounds filled the chasm along with a shower of sparks.  Bits of broken metal blade flew off the destroyed machines pinging about her vicinity like tracer bullets from a Gatling Gun!

Claire was afforded no time to enjoy her triumph as she wove her body closer to the edge of the web and freedom concentrating on the goal not the reward along the way.  Her exertions went on unabated, her lungs burning for air, her pliant willowy body glowing from her labours of extrication as rivers of unrelenting effort ran off her!  She was getting closer despite the constant backtracking; she entangled two more gyros of steel death their metallic death screams once again filling the void, but at a price!  She lost her grip on the fabric and it slipped away, she only had the one-piece left and 10 feet to go!

She moved her supple form with amazing agility and speed a testament to her conditioning, a bent leg, a twist body, a raised limb or a backward arch got her close but at a price, she was spent!  Her calf muscles cramped, she missed a step, slipped and fell hard to the ground right into the path of opposite approaching spinning saws, she was trapped!

The spy in a flash tied opposite ends of the suit to each then her ankles.  She twisted on her stomach arched up on all fours like a cat ready to pounce and sprang forward executing a neat mid-air body tight somersault as she went!  Her timing was perfect; her legs split apart at the last second avoided the rotating blade as they rose up and caught on the shaft!  The momentum carried her 180 degrees around; her head flying back to avoid a swing pendulum saw blade as she went.  She flew around the approaching second death saw wrapping it in fabric around the spindle as she reached for and clasped the door handle in her one hand before the other came over top and joined its mate!

Claire pulled furiously with her legs, dipping her back to avoid a swing blade in the process!  The two poles could not resist the power of the woman’s legs; they crashed together, splintered apart and snapped off at the base, the debris sent one flying into other still swinging saw as they bounced about room like a series of frenzied pinballs! 

The exhausted woman pulled her legs quickly to her, hugging her body against the door sweat and relief mixing together in victory!

‘Excellent and ingenious Miss Baxter.  I only hope you can make each situation as sexy and exciting as that one was.  The film is off to a roaring start let’s see if you can keep up the momentum for the second reel,’ his venomous voice proclaimed!

Claire offered no response; she was too tired and hot to waste the energy.  Besides she knew the drill as her hand turned the doorknob for a second fateful time! 

‘Out of the frying pan and into the fire, eh Miss Baxter?’ Sebastian’s smarmy voice echoed.

Claire’s overheated body couldn’t have put it better!  The chamber was steaming hot and with excellent reason, it was a jungle setting.

‘Tell me Claire, which would you rather be in this scene?  The vastly over dressed and under qualified European female explorer who despite being as she always tells the handsome white male explorer, more than capable of taking care of herself seems incapable of firing a gun, wielding a knife or anything else when ‘danger comes a knockin’ other than to scream for help?’

‘Or would you rather be the voluptuous and desirable jungle girl?  Who although she has managed to survive the perils and rigors of the forest since she was a little girl separated from her parents and then raised by apes seems incapable of doing anything right once the handsome white male from civilisation comes along and falls madly in love with her?

Claire let him babble while she caught her breath, either way the perils would be the same for her, whatever they were.

‘What one do you want me to be?’ she said seductively to him already knowing what his response would be.

‘It would be such a shame to hide that delectable body of yours under so many impractical garments, don’t you think?  Your costume is located in the second box from the left by the door,’ he panted lustfully.

Claire moved to the box opened it and pulled out as she suspected a Cheetah Print mini dress.  She slipped it on and smoothed it into place.

‘Excellent!  A prettier last of The Cheetah Women never existed!  You will notice that a path leads away into the room.  Various paths intersect as you move deeper in the jungle; choose anyone you like they all lead to an exit.  Do not venture off the path; if you do I’m afraid, well let’s just leave it at that!  Of course, predicaments of unimaginable peril await your every move Claire the Cheetah Woman!’ he laughed.

‘Don’t I at least get a knife to accessorise my outfit?’ she said swing her hips a little and turning a thin ankle upward.

There was a pause before he answered in a slightly short of breath voice.  ‘I’mmm afraid that might give you and unfair advantage and greatly expand the production cost of the film.  I’m still hoping this is just a two reeler.’

‘Sorry, but I prefer the full feature length movie,’ she replied.

Claire started carefully down the path as he yelled action knowing full well that’s what she’d be experiencing in an all too short time!  Just a cursory glance told her this chamber was much bigger than the last, much bigger, even with the vegetation she couldn’t see the end of one length of wall!  The spy pushed aside a large leaf blocking her way and cautiously began her odyssey.

The path was narrow and darkly illuminated from the lights above, just like a real jungle, which to Claire’s mind it certainly seemed like, even down to the insects that crawled under her feet.  Fallen vines and foliage covered the path in places forcing the Cheetah Woman to be warily of concealed traps.  Pushing leaves and loose hanging vines away she mindfully moved forward toward what she thought was the sound of rushing water.  Claire stepped over a large fallen log across the path and sat down, the heat and humidity forcing the respite.

‘I’m going to need some water soon and later some…’ she thought to herself.

‘Shit!’ she screamed a second later as the corner of her eye caught the thief skittering away.  Claire sprang after it searching the undergrowth, scattering the fallen debris to uncover its hiding place before it could make good its escape and report to the others!  The Cheetah Woman fell down on hands and knees desperately seeking its hiding place, she lunged, missed and her chance was gone as it moved off the path and into her forbidden zone of entry.  Claire wasted no time she scrambled to her feet and moved almost ran towards the sound of the running water, she had to get across it before it was too late!

‘Correct me if I’m wrong Claire, my entomology was never that good, but wasn’t that a Madagascar Blood Beetle that bit you?’ Sebastian’s voice mused in laughter.  ‘I’ll take your silence and frantic pacing at the moment as a yes.  Really Claire you need to be more vocal, this movie does have sound as well and the watchers will want to know your thoughts from time to time?’

‘Oh, sorry, you’re right,’ she answered.  ‘How about go fuck yourself! Is that expressive enough for you!’

‘Anyway, I take by that less than Shakespearean quote that I was correct about the insect.   Too bad you let it get away, by now it’s reported back the nest the whereabouts of a new food source.  Soon the jungle will be swarming with hundreds, maybe thousands of them all converging on the food source, namely you, my dear.  They’ll swarm all over your lovely, juicy body, covering you in a moving blanket of beetles as they feast on you!  I understand their bit is quite painful, it should make for some excellent audio and a fitting climax to the film!’ he triumphed.

Claire stumbled, got up, turned a corner and mercifully found the stream just ahead.  It was only about 3 feet wide, narrow but fortunately the water ran fast, the beetles wouldn’t be able to cross it all she had to do was jump across to safety.  She caught her breath and then it hit her, the smell!  The spy hurriedly picked a leaf off a tree and tenderly approached the river, but stopping short once more.  Carefully she brushed away some leaves several feet from the edge of the rushing water and discovered the trap, Punji sticks!  The sharpened bamboo sticks, each placed just inches apart from one another covered the entire paths width and came out several feet from the riverbank!  One step would have impaled her foot and sealed her fate!  The other side of the bank seemed to hold the same fate, making a leap across out of the question.  The leaf answered the final part of the trap; Claire crushed and tossed it into the water, already knowing the outcome.  It burned away on contact, the river was highly acidic!

‘Runoff from a recently erupted volcano Claire,’ the director voiced.  ‘Maybe I forgot to mention that.’

The spy was clearly running out of options.  She picked up a small stone at her feet and tossed it just off the path, it sank out of sight in seconds.

‘Quicksand all around you, acid water and needles behind you and what do I hear coming towards you?  It sounds like the advance of an army, a very hungry army!’ his maniacal voice boomed.

The leaves rustled along the path and the ground seemed to move with the eerie flow of a serpent as a wall of reddish brown beetles covered everything in their advancing path.  Claire’s eyes darted all about but all avenues of escape were closed!  She backed up slowly and then more quickly as the moving wall advanced the sound of their clicking legs counting down in drumbeat fashion the few seconds she had left!

Claire took a final step backward and stopped; she had no more room to manoeuvre!  Her eyes grew wide as she watched the onrushing army blacken the earth before her as the swarm neared its prey! 

Claire out of options and most assuredly out of time swung round knelt down and closed her hands around the shaft of two Punji sticks shoulder width apart and leaned forward and up!   Slowly the spy pushed her lissom figure off the ground her hands gripping the shafts of the bamboo with white-knuckle determination!   Her mind focused Claire slowly raised her legs up above her head, stretching her body out full her eyes just centimetres from the razor-sharp edges of the sticks!  The Cheetah Woman split her legs into a figure four to balance herself out and prepare for her next move.

The agent pushed up on her arms and locked them straight, steadied her swaying body.  A rapier move of one arm secured it around a new Punji Stick, one closer to the stream.  Again, she balanced herself then brought the other arm back her hand securing around the base and gripping with all she had!

‘Tell me you’re getting all this on film, every camera, every angle!’ Sebastian said his pulse racing.

‘Yes sir,’ came the almost distracted response of the remote camera operator as he, like his boss, was entranced by the woman on screen.

Claire continued to quickly hand stand her way along the sticks.  She never looked up at the approaching beetles, instead concentrating on what she could control; anything else would only generate panic on her part.  The jungle heat and stifling humidity quickly jewelled her body in tiny dots of perspiration that clung to her skin seemingly unwilling to fall away from her even as they grew in size.  Droplets jiggled as she moved until unable to resist the attractive pull of gravity they broke and ran free.

Several drops streamed down her long shapely extended gam the race of moisture gathering momentum as they crossed her slim ankle and coiled around her shapely calf, the water running into the contours of her muscles as they flexed wondrously only to emerge at the knee.  Slipping over it they encircled her taut thighs, finding all the smooth hardness they possessed perfect for their rapid acceleration up to her hips before they cheatingly disappeared beneath the costume and onto more intimate liaisons with what lay beneath the material.

The spy worked on, the sweat making her hold on the shafts of bamboo tentative at best.  Her body was bathed in her exertions, the costume damp and sticky against her slick oily skin that only served to show off her lithe form to the fullest within the contrasting light of the jungle.  Her hand arrived at the last stick and closed around it before she began to lower her body.

The COIL agent’s beautiful back and shoulders came alive under the strain, hard yet sexy muscles pushed and probed to the surface straining the costume to contain her!  Claire carefully lowered her legs, her back and arms bearing all the weight, her face showing the strain of the contest as the villains in the control both watched in dumb amazement, their mouths hung open with hunger.  Her rigid torso and legs now hung parallel across the rushing water, her long willowy oaken legs just reaching to between the third and fourth row of Punji Sticks on the opposite bank.  Attentive to the points and deliberate in her actions Claire lowered her slim ankles down in between the gaps in the sticks.  She shimmied and worked her calves in as best she could, her smooth round ass applying added tension with the slightest wiggle and undulation of her hips to push them in as far as possible!

Claire looked up just in time to gaze right at the approaching beetle army, just inches from her face!  The Cheetah woman released her handhold on the sticks, coiled her muscles hard and pulled up screaming in pain as she did from the strain.  Her eyes met the advancing army only inches from her face her body now suspended over the acid river, her face and neck barely six inches above the wooden spikes!  An advance party of beetles had managed to bridge the gap to her before she pulled up and now Claire savagely batted her hair and neck as the marauders scurried about her hot glossy neck and arms intent upon inserting their hungry probes into and feeding upon her! The unlucky disentangled lovers fell with a hiss into the acid; the luck fell back in amongst the hordes of the unlucky army.

Finally, free of her attacks Claire willed her body back as her calves seemed to wrap themselves around the shafts of the bamboo poles and tighten!  She thrust backward, up and over until her hands reached out, searched, found and gripped two shafts, her body now bent back upon itself.

‘Your Yoga skills are truly impressive Miss Baxter, that section in DOOM’s dossier on you doesn’t do you justice!  

 You certainly have a very flexible and pliant body,’ he said somewhat still unhinged by her marvellous display of fluidity.

Claire loosened her calf muscles and slipped her legs free of the sticks, slowly heightening them into the figure four once again.

‘Most men have the same reaction as you, only their usually more intimately involved in the process when they say it!’ she quipped as she came to an erect handstand once more.

The insect army enraged at having their prey escape them plunged into the rushing water, their bodies swept on each other and quickly dissolving as they swam in the acid bath.  Claire heard the pops and fizzes of their exploding shells as she worked her way along the Punji Sticks her mind willing her on to the end.  She came onto solid ground a few minutes later and collapsed on her back her chest heaving as she sucked in much needed air and gazed at the ceiling until she saw it!

The spy fought to her feet and staggered forward and sideways crashing into the desired tree trunk.  Her arms, numb from her workout, crawled their way up the smooth bark of the tree until she closed both her hands around the desired object!  She let her feet fall from under her, the weight pulling the mango from its stem as she went.  Claire frantically tore the skin away and ravenously devoured the fruit, its nourishment giving her the energy to rise and get another.

‘You should have asked if you could have eaten that safely Claire?  You never know it could be poisonous to your health!’ Sebastian hinted.

Claire ignored him; she knew better the kind of death he had in store for her and kept on eating.  She finished a third, took the large pit and smashed it against the base of a Punji Stick until it cracked!

‘Since this production is too cheap to provide me with a knife I’ll just have to improvise!’ she said as she pulled the broken stick free.

‘You are proving to be much more cleaver and resourceful than I had anticipated Miss Baxter!  

However, the jungle still holds many surprises for the Cheetah Woman before she can claim victory!’

Claire smiled and started along the path once more, though more slowly than before as she let her arms and legs recover.  She twisted and turned down the winding path making slow progress, her eyes darting everywhere for hidden perils, but they couldn’t be everywhere at once!  Her foot slipped off a half-buried rock on the path and into the snare!  The rope closed her ankles before she could react and the once slow-moving jungle became a whirl of green as she spun through the air, her body twisting and turning as she went upward!

She came to rest hanging upside down, dazed and unfocused from her journey as she tried to get her bearings!  Claire fought the disorientation and nearly had it mastered when the rope broke or was cut or released!  She spun downward out of control her eyes too late focusing for a brief second as she neared the ground and the last of the daylight vanished as she fell into the pit!  The last thing she could see was something moving at the bottom of her soon to be destination! 

The downward spiraling vortex created an illusionary sense of calm in the agent, she knew it was her mind playing tricks upon her, but to convince her body to react against the false state of bliss was more difficult!  Slowly, as if pulling against some imaginary great force Claire first closed her hands around her makeshift knife then swung it back and forward with force until it contacted the wall of the pit.  Wet earth spewed out as she rammed the point deeper into the soft earth, slowly her velocity decreased then stopped.

A quick glance up and down confirmed her precarious position, 20 hard feet straight up lay escape; 10 feet down lay the soft cool earth and the waiting coils of a giant Anaconda!  She guessed a least 15 feet of crushing death just waiting to welcome her into its fatal embrace!

‘Onward and upward Claire,’ she said stoically.

‘Easier said than done or is that the other way around in your case Miss Baxter.  You are proving to be all we’ve heard about you and so much more!  But speaking from a purely selfish angle why don’t you take the express elevator to the ground floor and let our pet welcome you with a nice cold-blooded hug?’

‘Thanks, but I’ll take a pass this time!  Besides I much more prefer hugs of a warm-blooded nature.   But just like your friend below me very few escape my embrace once they feel me around them,’ her voice seemed to slither.

Claire kicked a foot hold in the soft wet dirt of the pit wall with her left foot then repeated the procedure with the right taking the strain of her arms.  She rested a few minutes before freeing one of her legs, raising it and kicking a ledge in the wall.  A foot at a time the spy longingly worked her way up the escarpment and the makeshift knife surged over the precipice, embedded in the ground and she pulled herself free.

‘Congratulations and my deepest regrets on not seeing you coiled in the bands of death.  I had so hoped that would happen.  Oh well, maybe something else will come along,’ Sebastian said with a rising evil laugh that sent a chill down Claire’s spine.  She knew unfortunately for her that something else was going to come along!  She brushed off the accumulated dirt from her clothes and body as best she could from her climb and started out again.

The path meandered for a bit her eyes darting and dashing about for danger that always seemed present but never materialized until finally she came to the long-promised convergence of paths.  The spy wasted no time in choosing her destination partly because to her mind, not knowing what lay down each path made all the odds even and more importantly she didn’t want to listen to Sebastian’s voice spouting nonsense. 

‘The last thing I want to hear is a quote from Robbie Burns about ‘The Road Less Travelled!’ she thought to herself as she walked on, the path slowly dipping and turning downward as she went.

The jungle dense before now seemed to close in even tighter about her, what little light that could get through the thick overhead canopy danced a strange and worrisome shadow play all around her putting Claire even more on edge.  The daylight almost looked to be defused, like she was seeing it through a kind of opaque lens that distorted the picture just enough to make it appear out of focus and softer than it should.

All the images became clear and focused, as did the spy’s mind in the next instant as she sprang forward and rolled away from the falling object above!  The netting had just missed trapping her and as wasn’t waiting around to meet the owner!  Claire moved quickly down the narrow path taking her chances with the increased rate of speed but determined to put some distance between herself and her latest unseen opponent!  Slowly the path got wider until it disappeared altogether and she emerged into a small clearing.

‘This isn’t good Claire!’ she said to herself ‘Keep moving!’

Several steps later the Cheetah Woman felt a sharp prick in her thigh!  She pulled out the dart, stared at it momentary as if in some sort of scientific inquisition then it slipped from her hand as she fell limp to the ground her entire body overcome in the merest of instances as the poison ran through her system.  Her mind hazed and her eyes distorted and tilted the picture but from the bush emerged two men who came toward her with a long wooden pole.    Claire powerless to resist was strapped to it by her hands and feet whisked off the ground between the two men and transported along the path the natural swaying rhythm and the drug rocking her unconscious within minutes!

‘Now it’s your turn my dear!  You get the big finale, the final scene!’

Claire pushed her mind up from the grogginess as the drug wore off, she was still in the jungle, where she had no idea, but from her predicament she knew she was in trouble and bound to get worse, bound being the operative word!

‘Look what my foragers have brought their queen, a Cheetah Woman!  Trying to pass through my kingdom without permission only to be ensnared!’

‘Tiffany?’ Claire said as she focused on the creature before her.

‘Address me as Queen Spideria and I will grant you a quick and painless death!  Else you shall scream and beg for mercy within the confines of my web!’

Claire was well and truly stuck in a giant spider’s web!  The sticky silken threads adhering to her, immobilizing her movements to futile struggles.  Like a helpless fly, she twisted for freedom, each wiggle cementing her further into the lair of the Spider Queen.  Thin gossamer threads crisscrossed her body, the intricate weaving adding steel like strength to the cocoon that surrounded her webbed body.

‘Struggle all you like my dear my threads have you secured quite permanently.  Not even your great strength can break free of my special webbing!’ 

Claire twisted and writhed and flexed within the web but she couldn’t escape no matter what she tried.  Tiffany smiled deliciously as she watched Claire sensuously move her body within the intricate trap before she stopped struggling her body having worked itself taut in the web unable to bend anymore!

‘Don’t spend all your energy in vain, you’ll need some for later!’ the Spider Queen cooed as she approached her now helpless prey.

‘It may comfort you to know that your death will be the birth of a new generation of life!  So, in a sense you’ll live on forever, but only in pieces as my baby’s hatch and devour you alive!’ Tiffany hissed in delight playing her part to the maximum and then some as she pulled a lever and the floor below Claire began to open on both sides from the centre.

‘Opening up below you is the pit containing a mixture of my eggs in a special liquid coating.  You will be dipped into the pit allowing the mixture to coating your completely.  Once completed the liquid will soon congeal and seal you tight in its grip.  Your body heat will incubate and hatch the eggs within hours!  Once free my hungry children will first devour the liquid and then you!’ she schemed.

Tiffany pushed and held down a button on the top of the lever and the web started to lower slowly downward!  The Spider Queen watched in rapt fascination as the first part of the web contacted the mixture her eyes transfixed on the submerging silk.

‘It would be long now Cheetah Wom..’ she cried in disbelief as out of the corner of her eye pounced Claire upon her in true catlike fashion her body extended and arched as she took her prey to the ground!

‘It certainly won’t be!’ Claire smiled as she pinned Tiffany’s shoulders to the ground and secured her knees on top of them freeing her hands.

‘How did you escape my special webbing!’ the Spider Queen asked in astonishment still playing her part much to Claire’s surprise but she decided to play along as well now that she had the upper hand.

‘A Cheetah Woman’s claws cannot be so easily contained!  You should have clipped them before we started!’ Claire smiled as she tensed her hands in Tiffany’s face.  ‘My nails, thanks to a little science can be sharpened to a deadly cutting edge, giving me a concealed weapon of lethal abilities!  Shall I demonstrate?’ Claire said putting a nail on Tiffany’s neck.

‘Please no!’ she screamed.  ‘I’ll show you the way out of this section!’ she begged.

‘I can find that myself what I need is the way out of this madhouse of a maze!’ Claire answered.

‘Sebastian would kill me if I did that!’

Claire knew this was going nowhere.  She also knew that Tiffany was most likely correct; he would kill her that made her useless as a bargaining chip and to Claire.

‘What do you say Herr Director, my freedom for your wife?’ Claire said aloud certain one of the many numerous microphones was picking it all up.

‘Art sometimes requires sacrifices!’ came the response she’d expected.  ‘Besides, Miss Baxter you’re much to sporting to do anything of that nature,’ he chortled in a self-assured tone.

Claire smiled at Tiffany for a second before releasing her knees to a relieved smile from the Spider Queen before the spy rolled backwards taking Tiffany with her and sailing her backwards through the air until the Spider Queen contacted her own web and became its prisoner!

‘NO! NO!’ Tiffany screamed again and again as Claire calmly activated the winch and lowered her into the liquid!

‘Your right art sometimes does require a sacrifice!  The question is now do you love your wife enough to save her from the fate you had in store for me or do you want this once in a life time footage on film?  I’ll leave you to contemplate the matter!’ Claire smiled as she disappeared from the clearing.

A short while later she found the door to the next room, she turned the latch and disappeared.  Claire wasn’t sure if she heard screaming as she closed the door or if the hinges just needed oiling. 

Claire had expected yet another chamber; instead she found herself at the end of a hallway, perhaps ten feet in length with a door at the other end.  Half way down hung her next change of clothes.

‘My next costume no doubt,’ she said sarcastically.

Instead she found a pair of loose cotton casual pants, a tee shirt and a pair of sandals with a small heel.  She wiggled out of her jungle dress, tossed it away and donned her new outfit, then made her way to the door, turned the handle and stepped in.

‘From Cheetah Woman to Soccer Mom in under two minutes,’ she laughed.

‘Tickets! Get your tickets here!’ barked a short fat man in a top hat from inside a glass booth.  The spy’s eyes narrowed and blazed with fury at the site of Sebastian her tormentor!  She vaulted towards the booth and assaulted it with a series of punches and kicks hoping to smash her way in to get at him!

‘That would have been much too easy Claire! Don’t you think?  This Plexiglas is like clear steel my dear.  In fact, it’s impervious to fire, bullets and most importantly for my sake, female spies!’ Sebastian said with a tip of his top hat to the frustrated woman.

‘Anyway, don’t be so upset, you’re at a carnival!’ as he spoke lights came on flashing and blinking away as stereotypical carnival music filled the air and the chamber was filled with rides and games of chance.

‘Today is your lucky day Miss you’ve just won a free pass to our all new Log Ride,’ Sebastian Devilliers said as he twirled his handlebar moustache.

Claire gave the glass booth a final lunge and a slap startling him for a second before her face broke into a smile. 

‘Stay on guard Sebastian, your turns coming!’ she offered before scooping up her ticket and making her way to the start of the log ride, to which, unsurprising she was the only rider.

A typical hollowed out log reminiscent of so many amusement park rides awaited her.  She slipped herself into the seat and slowly the log began its journey down its watery path bumping and splashing within the sluiceway.  The spy eyes darted everywhere; aware that the only form of amusement Sebastian was interested in was her death for his cinematic masterpiece!  The log pushed forward picking up speed as it banged around a sharp corner headed for a tunnel with closed doors as its entrance.  The spy braced herself but the log merely hit the doors with a thud and after a moment of hesitation pushed them open and disappeared inside.

‘Out of sight, out of mind,’ Claire thought.  ‘A perfect time for me to leave!’   She pushed up with her arms on the sides of the log only to discover her feet wouldn’t budge from off the floor of the log!  Somewhere, sometime, without her knowing it they had been secured in place with a manacle and length of chain on each ankle and she was trapped!  She pulled frantically but completely ineffectively.  The COIL agent could hear the chain about each leg rattling as she struggled as the ride exited the tunnel, took another sharp and then a steep downhill plunge that dashed her torso hard over against the front of the log!  A wall of water cascaded over her as the log crashed into the pool at the bottom of the descent the sudden jerking stop knocking temporarily at least most of the air from her lungs!  The ride bobbed along for a few seconds before the front end bumped into and then found traction on a conveyor belt and started upward.   Claire straightened up, shuck herself, cleared her eyes and felt her pupils dilate with fear as she looked at the apex of conveyor ride!

It gleamed in the dim light from above!  All shinny and menacing its hungry teeth glowing white hot as it spun in sharpened fury and ravenous for the meal that approached!  The teeth cutting the air with a high pitched screaming whine that would soon be taken over with the distinctive sound of chewing and tearing as they cut into the approaching log!  The saw blade had to be six feet in diameter, three of which would be turning through the log and its occupant in a manner of seconds!

‘What’s the matter Miss Baxter, no cutting remarks to offer me this time!’ Sebastian’s voiced boomed above the whirl of the blade.  ‘Sorry I can’t help the puns!  My doctor tells me it’s genetic but I think he’s merely splitting hairs or do I mean Claire’s!  Oh, there I go again,’ his cackling laughter drowning out the saw.

‘Then you need to change veterinarians!’ Claire counter punched.

The spy heaved her legs, hoping something would give, but she was held fast!  She looked up just in time to see and feel the first bite of the blade into the front of the log!  The whine of the free spinning blade slowed to the more bone chilling sound of tearing wood flesh as sawdust and small shards of wood flew into the air as the wooden skeleton of the ride was ripped apart as soon would be the real flesh and blood of the spy!  Claire was two feet from the onrushing blade as it bore down the centre of the log rushing straight at her its teeth grinning at the prospect of something much softer to bite into!

The blade hit a knot in the wood less than a foot from her causing the log the jump up a little in the air as the wood stymied the metal monster for a few seconds as it slowed the blade in its tracks!  The disc sputtered, stop, lurched, false started and then slowly began to turn again gaining rpm’s as its carbide teeth bit into the wood and pulled its defiant victim back and down into its grip once more!  A shower of wet sawdust fell about Claire as the blade pulled to within 6 inches as the spy calculated her fate!  She could almost hear the saw laughing at her was she struggled and it inched closer, four, three, two.

Claire at the last second crossed her long legs as far up as she could and executed a plie.  Her toes, calves and thighs, despite her excellent condition and yoga training strained to hold the position as the blade torn through the wood directly under her!  She could feel the hum of the saw as it mangled the log!  Her eyes zeroed in on the apex of the blade as she pushed up with all she had and watched it come between her legs as she prayed she had enough clearance!  Her whole body pulsed as the blade sang its siren song dangerously close the teeth she felt reaching up the her trying to drag her down into the sea of destruction below!  Her body strained, but she held back the pain, reserving it for later freedom as the top most of the blade caught and cut her pants before spinning onward!

The summit receded, Claire fell forward her hands outstretched on either side of the metal sphere as it caught and pinged against the chain that held her!  A shower of sparks now replaced the sawdust as blade dulled against its metal cousin!  Claire forced her feet flat and in place as her legs began to feel the heat of the battle between the two metal opponents.  The chain and blades clanged and tangled for several minutes, Claire frozen in place and hoping the saw blade could withstand the damage and chew its way through before it lost all its teeth or worse, broke apart and imbedded itself in the wood or her! 

The grinding metal sound went on unabated it seemed until the spy felt a sharp jerk and the ripping of wood and shower of sawdust returned.  Claire pulled her legs free up and over as she executed a somersault, rolled on the front of the not quite cut in two log, latched onto the railing and heaved a sigh a relief!

She wasted no time climbing over the edge and making her way down the scaffolding to the ground.

Claire found her way out and started to make for one of the doors intent on leaving as fast as she could!  The spy walked down the midway lined on either side with deserted rides and games of chance, turned a corner and continued keeping a watch out for more fun and games.

‘Ring the bell and win a prize!  Who wants to try? Impress the ladies with your strength!  Humble the gentleman with your skill!  Step right up don’t be shy.  How about you little lady?’  said a very large man as the lights came on over a previously darkened area Claire was just about to pass.

She knew she had to stop, it was all part of the game she was being forced to play out, it still didn’t mean she liked being manipulated like some puppet on a string.  The barker looked like an old-fashioned blacksmith, bald head, moustache, huge arms, and barrel chested with stubby beefy legs.

‘What do I get if I ring the bell?’ Claire asked as she took the pre-offered mallet.

‘You get to live, the ultimate prize!’ he answered with a menacing smile

‘Step back folks and give the little woman some room!’ he said for effect as Claire took her stance in front of the fulcrum and weight.  She knew it was more technique than power that won this game as she took her grip on the mallet and swung it back before sliding one of her hands down the shaft of the mallet and crossing it above her head just in time to block the downward thrust of the barker’s mallet to her head!

She thrust her arms forward locking the shaft of her mallet around the end of his and tossing him over her shoulder and to the ground in front of her.

‘No fair if you’re going to cheat like that.  I think I’m entitled to a free swing and as a matter of fact I’ll think I’ll take it at your head!’ Claire smiled as she crashed the flat of the mallet into the side of his head as he rolled away partially avoiding the full impact of the blow.   The barker staggered to his feet and began to swing his mallet until he recovered his senses enough to squash this little woman!

Claire let him swing wildly, her lithe body dancing out of the way.  She let his great strength work against him as she frustrated his power with her quickness until she grew tired of the game and turned to the offensive.  The spy blocked a wide swing to her shoulders with a crossed mallet, turned the handle 90 degrees and rammed it home into his stomach before upper cutting it into his chin!  Dazed he stumbled backwards as Claire took several steps toward him, planted the mallet in the ground and launched herself off of it into the air connecting with a flying kick to the chest that crashed him to the ground at her feet!

‘Tell you what how about we end it now and I’ll let you keep your life?’ she said.

He swung a roundhouse one hander then she jumped up and over before pounding the end of the mallet into his soft stomach, reversing and crashing the wide end into his nuts that brought him up at the waist then doubled him over in pain!  Claire came around the back of him placed the mallets shaft around his neck and forced the helpless man to his feet dragging him over to the game before forcing him to his knees.

‘Now I get my swings uninterrupted!’ she said tossing away her mallet and grabbing the scruff of his neck.  ‘Hope your foreheads as thick as the rest of you my friend!’ she said as his head came forward and crashed into the fulcrum sending the weight rocketing up to and ringing the bell!  ‘What’s that you say? I can go double or nothing for the larger prize?  Ok, you talked me into it here we go!  Well what do you know I won again and you lost!’ she said derision in her voice as she let go of him as he slumped to the ground unconscious.

She picked up the mallet and headed off towards a door finding in without any further adventures.  Claire went through without hesitation. 

‘You know Sebastian this movie had already been made and it ruined Kevin Costner’s career?’ Claire said as she starred out at the next set from the small cement jetty.

‘Yes, but think how much better it would have been thought of had he died making the film!  Instead he just makes one film after another now that nobody sees or cares about.  Don’t let that happen to you Claire!  Make this your epic to be remembered by!  Just think of it, James Dean, Bruce Lee and Claire Baxter all basically one hit wonders who still live on because of it.  I know you won’t let me down!’  Sebastian said mockingly.

‘In this scene, you play British spy Jane Bondage.  Your mission is to swim to the island located in the middle of this set once there you enter a hidden trap door located under a fake rock and from there you have your pick of any of the doors as usual.  That completes the scene,’ he said calmly.  ‘Good luck Miss Bondage!’

Claire had changed into the skin-tight black one-piece diving suit that had been provided.  It’s close but comfortable fit left nothing to the imagination as it displayed all her curves and contours to perfection.  She stretched a little to loosen her body up then put on the tank checked her air, slipped on her mask and fins and slipped her Eel like body silently into the water. 

Claire, aka Jane Bondage slipped silently through the water her wet suited body cloaked in darkness.  The only sign of her presence the air bubbles she exhaled along the way.  She’d taken a bearing before starting out and had regularly checked it against the illuminated wrist compass.  Claire checked it once more pausing to glance and turn herself onto the new bearing before starting out again.  She kicked her swim fins hard, maybe too hard as she felt them slip from her feet!

‘Damm!’ she thought to herself before a sudden thrust downward relegated the lost fins as unimportant!

A sudden burst of air bubbles came to the surface, then calm for a long period of time before a constant stream broke the plane of the water.  As if on cue lights flooded the chamber from above and below the surface and the camera whirred into action giving Claire all the visual she needed!

It must have been in body eight or ten feet in length, but with its tentacles it was more like sixteen feet although it was difficult for Claire to clearly discern the giant squid’s true dimensions as half of its sucking appendages were secured about her!  The frantic spy twisted and turned in the water trying futilely to pull free of its grip as her labours bubbled around her in the expended air from her escape attempts!

Quickly the squid’s labyrinth of streaming tentacles closed around her, adhering to as tightly to her as her second skin!  With nothing to pry or brace her body against the spy was helpless to battle her clinging conqueror from the deep!  Carefully the tentacled behemoth reeled in its meal as it turned and pulled her down and further into its grip clasping and pressing each expertly constructed suction cup about its struggling resistant prey.

Claire battled each cup as they creature rotated and twirled her drawing her body down further into its watery domain and her demise!  The spy felt each suction cup slowly caress against her suit and then gently press down hooking and holding her!  Each cup reducing her freedom just that much more with each passing second!

The last roping appendage whipped around her and pulled her in!  The squid tugged and pulled reeling in its prize as Claire was spun downward into a vortex of self-adhering bounds!  Powerless to prevent her entrapment the woman was knit tightly to her master as he pulled her to the bottom of the pool to devourer her!

The ever-present woman checked her air and depth gauge as they went, even if she managed to break free she would, depending on the depth need time to decompress on the way up and that would require sufficient air reserves.

‘Too many factors and only one Claire!’ she thought as they hit bottom at 45 feet and 10 minutes of air to go at a normal breathing rate, but she knew in reality that she only had five at best!

Luckily the creature at deposited her in a slight crevice that she now proceeded to wedge her body into.  ‘Maybe if I make it too difficult for him he’ll give up his tasty meal and try for something else!’ she thought hopefully as she wiggled her slippery body into place as the squid started to winch her in!

She resisted gamely, spending her precious air in a shower of bubbles that rose to the surface and broke gently apart belying the frantic death struggle that took place below!

‘The creature doesn’t realise the great honour it has in holding such a beautiful woman within its arms!  But I’m sure it appreciates the rare catch it has stumbled across Miss Baxter!’ Claire heard inside her mask.

‘Great! Just what I need, commentary from a black caped villain on my impending demise!’ Claire thought in exasperation.

‘Too bad he doesn’t respond to your usual curvaceous charms as most do who hold you in their arms otherwise he would be your victim by now I suspect, eh Miss Baxter!’ Sebastian taunted.

Claire strained her body against the rocks; her feet acting as her only brace as the squid had her arms pinned to her sides and endlessly secured in its tentacles.  Her muscles and sinews pushed to the surface and rippled through the suit creating an even more alluring package, if possible, as her body battled the clutching death about her!

The squid pulled and tugged her but she managed to stymie its force until it moved around her and slowly pulled the other way!  Claire’s foot slipped then skidded off the rock and she was free in seconds coursing across the sleek sheen of the algae covered rocks toward her doom her feet frantically trying to re-establish contact with the bottom!  She missed her last chance was lifted upward and pulled with a sudden rush toward the open jaws of the squid a terrifying scream escaping soundless from her in the form of bubbles that broke noiselessly on the surface! 

Clack, Clack, Clack snapped the beak of the squid as it hungrily tore and ripped at its meal!  The ferocity of its intent enough to fill the water around it with menacing sound waves and streams of black ink cloaking the field of battle in terminal darkness!  Within those dark recesses, Claire bent, twisted and writhed and danced her body mere centimetres from capture!

Instead of being pulled it head first to her doom she had through, luck or skill or perhaps a combination of both managed to twist her form sideways during the squid’s last thrust of her!  The spy had managed to hook her fingers and toes onto either side the creature’s month sinking them into his boneless gelatinous skin and arching back her body with all she had to avoid his razor-sharp beak! 

‘No man gets to eat me that easily!’ Claire allowed herself to think as the two predators twisted and writhed about the bottom of the tank the spy still fastened firmly into the suckers of the squid!  The stalemate would only last as long as her rapidly diminishing air supply then she would be defenceless and made short work of by the ravenous leviathan!  She needed to take the advantage back if only for a second.  ‘But if planned right,’ she thought. ‘That should be all I need!’

The spy steadied herself as best she could waiting for the creature to calm itself for a brief second and the water to clear from the ink!  Her chance came quicker than she had expected she loosened her hands and arched her body inward towards the snapping mouth until she was right on top of it!  The sound of the vice like jaws and the flow of water they displaced coated her senses!  Claire’s eyes widened as she leaned forward and let the squid snap its jaws around the front of her face!  She pulled away just in time; freeing her undamaged face but leaving her mask behind as it disintegrated into shards of glass that the creature swallowed with abandon!

She was thrust inward again and again she arched and managed to grasp the fleshly boneless skin of her opponent but just for second before she slipped free.  This time thought the squid having come so close wanted more and pulled her in at the waist clamping his beak around her hips, detaching the weight belt and digesting it all in one action!

‘Eating me piece by piece is not the worst offer I’ve had today,’ she thought in her usual black humoured way.

The two sank to the bottom as the twisting mass of tentacles flowed and strangled her body in their grip!  Her sleek eel skinned body lay on a rock as the creature settle in the sand just below her and reeled her in rolling its appendages mercilessly about her in a spinning vortex of clinging evolution! Claire slipped off the rock and into what seemed to be thousands of grasping hands that probed and gripped her into their snare as she was pulled helplessly to his mouth!

Tiny globules of blood filed the water hanging like red kites in the blue water before being washed away by a sudden shaking from the creature and a large discharge of air that was gone almost as soon as it had appeared!  The squid, bloated from its meal, swelled too twice its size and then more still as it pushed away from the battleground!

Blood floated to the surface seconds later along with pieces of flesh and bits of diving gear all mingling in a floating soupy film.

The victor settled on some rocks lay still and rested for a while before stirring and moving onto the centre of the island and her next challenge!

‘Never bite off more than you can chew!’ Claire said.  ‘Especially glass that can cause indigestion not to mention perforated ulcers and compressed air! That can give you the feeling that your insides are going to explode!’

She found the entrance and descended the ladder to the next challenge.

‘Fun and games are over!  It’s time to end this movie!’ she sounded in a hard voice Claire came to the bottom of the ladder and faced once again her choices of doors only this time she’d kept her bearings and chose her door with confidence.  She stepped inside and smiled, she chosen correctly.  The door to the next chamber opened as Sebastian watched with eager anticipation on the screen from the control room.

‘Where the hell is she!’ he screamed at no one and everyone at the same time as his star failed to appear after several minutes.  ‘Quick scan the other pods!  Maybe she’s doubled back on us?’ he barked to his assistants with just a hint of panic creeping into his voice.

He closed his eyes in fear when he received their all clear on the other pods!  Sebastian rushed over one of the control panels pushed aside the occupant and began frantically clicking buttons and flipping switches until he found the camera he wanted!  Carefully panning the lens, he closed in on the open doorway and with a few small adjustments and digital enhancements he found his answer.

‘She’s found the concealed access catch to the maintenance passageway and is now inside it!  Quick flood all the passageways with the poison gas before it’s too late!’ he yelled as sweat began to form on his brow.

One of assistants flicked a switch, then flicked it again, and again.  ‘She’s bypassed the master control and cut us off from it!  No go boss!’ he answered his voice now worried.

‘What about the sprinkler system?’ Sebastian pleaded.

‘Still on line!’ one of them answered.

‘Then flip the bloody switch and electrocute her!’ he screamed.

Sparks flew up in front of Claire as live power cables jostled with one other to be her dance partner.

‘Now I know what it’s like to be inside a Roman Candle on the 4th of July!’ she mused.

The spy gingerly walked and in places crawled along the steel gangway as she pushed through the dim glow provided by the emergency battery lights that were already starting to fade.  Claire had to pause several times as they flickered before continuing towards her goal up ahead, a steel ladder leading up and hopefully out of this nightmare!  The COIL agent exhausted beyond all measure pushed herself on remembering her SEAL training as she moved.

‘Remember your body will go as long as your brain tells it to!  Don’t let doubt or tiredness or indecision creep into it or you are finished!  Accomplish the mission that is the only thought you need to have focus on that!  Remember failure is not an option!’

‘Yeah sure Reinhardt!  But you never had to be a movie star!’ Claire said with a laugh remembering her SEAL trainer.

Claire moved along slowly dodging swing power cables and fighting the effects of the cold water from the sprinklers showering down upon her and numbing her body.  Finally, she was within range of the ladder when she heard a low growling sound building up from below.  It sounded exactly like those twisted metal sounds you hear from sinking ships in all the war movies!  The things went eerily silent for a second.

‘Oh shiiiiit!’ Claire yelled as the gangway collapsed from underneath her seconds later!

Her mind raced within those few seconds recording all the terrible things that were going to happen to her as she fell, but it was her body that reacted in the same time frame!  Already on her hands and knees her legs tensed and vaulted her off the falling chunk of metal towards to ladder!  She instinctively stretched out her hands, elongated her body and willed herself toward the ladder!  She missed with one hand but caught it with the other and held on as her body twisted and slammed into the concrete wall the ladder was anchored into!  Dazed she twirled in place for several seconds unaware of anything except the need for some reason or other to tense her one arm and clench her fist as tight as she could above her head!

Claire came to her senses when she tasted the acrid liquid of her own blood seeping from her forehead.  She swung round clasp her other hand to the bar and pulled up enough to grab the one above, she repeated the process until she could place the flats of her feet on the bottom rung her hand’s hand recently occupied. The spy advanced rapidly up the ladder looking above her for live power lines and other dangers.  Within sight of the hatchway a strange tingling came over her body, she tried to move up the ladder another rung but found her body slow to react!  She looked down just in time to see a second power cable fire off the wall in anger and slither about the air like a charged snake before it slammed into the ladder joining one of its cousins that had just preceded it!

Sparks charged up the rungs after her engulfing Claire in a curtain of light before ripping the ladder from its anchors and sending it spinning it a melted welded mass to the floor below!  

The environmental control panel blinked and then faded to black as light after warning light ceased to function to smiles all around.

‘That should be the end of Miss Baxter!’ Sebastian sighed in relief.  ‘Nobody, not even she could have survived all that electricity!  It’s a pity I couldn’t have captured it on film.  It would have made a fitting conclusion to my new film, ‘The Shocking Death of Claire Baxter – Former Agent of C.O.I.L.’ he chortled clasping one hand to his round stomach and the other twirled about one side of his moustache.

If you don’t think about it you just may be able to stay aloft forever, darting and diving in the air like a bird, unfettered by gravity and the constraints of humanity.  But then you inevitably think about it and you’re drawn back to earth.

‘Ooh crap!’ Claire said resolutely as she saw the concrete wall closing fast in front of her and prepared as best she could for the impact as be body melded into the grey unyielding slab with enough speed to deliver a blunt force trauma!  She rolled over and curled up on her side her body sore and bleeding from the impact her mind foggy.  Slowly she dragged herself unsteadily to her feet, more by sheer will power than anything else and that came from one overriding factor, revenge!

Her mind cleared enough for her to witness the some fifty to sixty feet she’d travelled from the edge of the ladders opening to where she now stood!  She knew she was lucky to even be alive, but here she stood, launched off the ladder by the discharging current like a rocket through the opening across the room in an ark and against the wall!

The battered, bruised and still somewhat bleeding woman lurched to the door and cautiously opened it.  

A long-awaited smile of relief crossed her face as she recognised the backstage area from her time that now seemed so long ago on the first set!  She stole through, dashing and darting behind various props and obstacles until she reached the main door off the set that she hoped led to the master control room.

‘The rough master copy will be ready in about three minute’s boss.  You can edit it off premises after that,’ one of the assistants said.

‘Excellent!  My greatest film yet and one that’s sure to be extremely rewarding, both financially and as a step up in the D.O.O.M. hierarchy!  Maybe I’ll make a sequel starting another one of their agents,’ he mused.  ‘Although Miss Baxter will be hard to top.’

‘Dumping me after one film? How ungrateful!’ came a voice from the door followed by a jet stream of white foam that covered and blinded the two assistants as Claire stepped toward them!  A flash of a red cylinder and the dull thud of metal on bone were all that was seen and heard before Claire tossed away the empty fire extinguisher and turned her attention on Sebastian.

‘You! Impossible!  No one could have survived!  Why aren’t you dead! Why weren’t you electrocuted!’ he screamed stamping his feet.

‘I owe it all to you,’ she smiled.  ‘Providing me with the neoprene wetsuit was a stroke of genius on your part!  I’ll bet you didn’t know that they make a very good insulator against an electric current!  Luckily for me there was just enough left of my suit for me to use as insulating strips on my hands and feet!’ she triumphed.

Sebastian was beside himself with rage, so much so his round stomach began to shake violently as his face turned purple in anger at having his villainous plan ruined!

‘You have destroyed my masterpiece!’ he screamed before rushing at her!

Claire had anticipated the move by uncoiling one of the insulating strips, making it into a short rope she was concealing behind her back.  The spy let him get close then darted to one side, brought her hands in front and corralled him around the neck as he stumbled past her!  A quick heave pulled him off his heavy feet into the air and crashed his heavy body to the floor!  A few well-placed kicks to his ribs rolled him over onto his stomach.  Claire cat quick plunged her foot into the back of his neck gathered up his hands and tied them securely behind his back with the neoprene rope!  His feet were bound before he had recovered enough to realise his fate was sealed!

The Cd spun through the air and landed directly under the eyes of Catherine Wycliffe, Director of C.O.I.L. Operations, Women’s Division.  She picked it up and smiled.

‘Is this what I think it is?’ she leaned back and smiled.

‘Everything and more and best of all it’s the only copy!’ Claire said taking a seat.

 ‘Meaning?’ Catherine asked.

‘Meaning once you’ve seen it please either destroy it or lock it away so we can keep this entire mission just between us!  I though in lieu of a boring written mission report this would be well more interesting!’ Claire laughed. 

‘How’s it end?’ Catherine asked.

‘Not the way it was scripted!  It seemed Sebastian Devilliers wanted the last scene to be a real cliff-hanger, literally, and he wanted to personally supervise its filming!  You know what they say about and artist and his work merging into one!’ she smiled.

‘I have to see this movie?’ Mrs. Hawthorne said.

^^^

‘There will always be a place for you here.’ Laxmi said as she offered Mrs. Hawthorne a cup of chai.  ‘I know you have unfinished business on the outside, but someday that will be concluded and then well who knows.  But, you must promise me one thing, that you will teach all you have acquired and all you will acquire to a worthy pupil or pupils.’

‘I promise I will,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said doing the praṇāmāsana her head touching the Saree of Laxmi indicating respect from student to teacher.

Laxmi softly stroked her student hair then bid her straighten back into the Lotus as she took her hands in hers.

‘You are the best I have ever taught and the best I have yet ever seen, but never let that go to your head, always be a student of the discipline,’ she added.

They finished their tea, rose and walked toward the gate of the Ashram where they hugged for a long while.

‘Say hello to Claire for me and give her my love,’ Laxmi said as they parted.

‘Have you been spying on our emails and talks,’ Mrs. Hawthorne asked in a joking manner.

‘Not at all my dear.  I can see it in your eyes, the look of a mother being reunited with her child.’

‘Namaste,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said as she bowed waited for the gate to close then turned wiped a tear from her eye and began her journey to meet up with Claire.  

My Enemies Enemy

‘The problem is twofold: the person and how you’re going about it.’ 

 ’I fine that very interesting and amusing if you don’t mind my saying so and frankly I don’t care if you do, coming from a person who has failed D.O.O.M. on more than one occasion in the past.

In fact, if memory serves me, you failed not once, but twice to kill a certain C.O.I.L. agent when you were stationed in the Congo Miss Prud’homme!’ 

Nancy Prud’homme didn’t blanch at the arrow fired her way she was well aware of her failure and had accepted it and the consequences as he well knew but she wasn’t about to let it pass without reminding him of events since then. 

’Yes, I failed to kill Claire Baxter, like many others in this organisation, but unlike others I managed to escape with my life and also unlike others I didn’t become a pawn for her to manipulate against us, like Azeema did!’ she shot back shifting to the offensive.  ‘I paid the price for my failure to D.O.O.M. 

I accepted my demotion with grace and I think to this point have performed my duties to perfection given the handicaps I was faced with!’ she added re-crossing her attractive legs for added emphasis. 

’Handicaps, you were lucky we didn’t terminate you for the colossal disaster that ensued because of you and your brother’s failure!’ he roared even as his eyes glanced at her limbs. 

’Yes handicaps,’ she said in a calm sugary voice.  ‘At age forty-six I’m stripped of my Field Directors title and made a D.O.O.M. Assassinatrix!  My word creation given my age,’ she smiled before continuing.  ‘Competing against C.O.I.L. agents and others half my age to attract and extract information from targets and terminate them.  My sex appeal and allurement talents could only go so far when stacked up against a young bikini’d C.O.I.L. operative.  D.O.O.M. put me where they did to die and many times I nearly did but my years of experience got me past my youthful opponents, I’m sure your surprise!  And here I sit today wondering what you’ve thought up to kill me know!’ she laughed.  ‘Only I don’t kill so easily as my dossier reads!’ she smiled sexily. 

’I understand from your dossier,’ he said adding a hint of irony to his voice.  ‘That your sex appeal and allurement talents as you put them are quite formidable as are your own bikini talents if this recent picture is any indication!’ he said flashing a picture from her thick dossier.  ‘You keep yourself in excellent condition I see!’ he added with a lecherous smile. 

‘A daring move on my part, but it yielded the desired results in the end,’ she smiled self-satisfied before continuing.  ‘Young female agents are strong and attractive.  I need to be able to match them as best I can, of course our methods are different,’ she said leaning forward to see if he wanted to know more.  She had a feeling a reprieve in her career was at hand and she needed to make the most of this opportunity to capitalise on it.

 

’Go on,’ he said his voice trying to stay on a level tone. 

’They like to kill with brute power!  I’m speaking of my confrontations with them.  Subtlety and softness are alien concepts to most of them and when up against an old woman like me it doesn’t even enter the equation!  Most either try to beat me down with high flying martial arts of apply some quick body hold and finish me that way thinking I can’t escape their young taut physiques.  Yet I’ve escaped everyone and collected quite a few names along the way, all victims of my experience!’ 

Nancy smiled.  ‘Now I take it you have one more for me and then I can be back in the good books of D.O.O.M.?’ 

’Back to your old position and perhaps depending on how this turns out or should I say how you make it turn out a large promotion on top of that!’ he smiled as he handed her a folder.  ‘As you said before experience is the key!  What do you think?’ 

‘She’ll never know who I am and as for the other if she should show up a change of hair colour should be more than adequate given so much of me as changed since we last met.  In fact, I hope she does show up I want that promotion and her death along with the other will be sweet revenge and poetic justice!  At least for one of us!’ Nancy laughed. 

’Don’t get ahead of yourself on this!  She’s a much tougher target than we anticipated!’ he said with a note of caution in his voice. 

‘As I said at the start of this conversation the problem is twofold: the person and how you’re going about it!  I assume you’ve tried young woman with some special expertise in an exotic style? Am I correct?’ she said and seeing his nod she continued on.  ‘I have no doubt these young nymphs and coquettes were well skilled but that’s where D.O.O.M. made its mistake, a mistake I assume you want me to correct?’ Nancy inquired. 

‘Perhaps we do, but I want to hear you convince me you’re the right woman for the job!’ he challenged. 

Nancy smiled as she formulated her answer.  

‘She’s the type of woman who requires a variety of styles to dispose of!  Instead of power, for her you need to use touch and adjustments.  Her executioner needs to feel and adjust her as she moves and not move her.  She needs to draw herself closer and work her body with and not against her as she struggles!  This is a tactic I use and as you’ve read my dossier bares out its effectiveness!’ she said with a sensuous grin.  ‘No, to kill this woman you use touch!  It’s much slower, but ooh so much more effective!’ she purred. 

He leaned back in his chair his pensive look slowly disappeared.  He made a note in her file, closed it, and passed her the assignment.  She knew she was dismissed but she was determined to make an exit so she slowly uncrossed her legs lifting her one leg a little higher than she needed to, swung elegantly in her chair, turned and walked towards the door.  She wiggled her ass a just a little as she crossed one leg in from of the other; she turned at the door, smiled then left! 

* * * * * * * * * * *

‘That one is stunning and it gives you lots of freedom to move!’ Gina Perini said. 

‘I don’t know about this one the other three are fine I suppose,’ she said hesitantly and not liking the fact that she sounded so.  ‘But this one I’m not too sure about?’ 

‘What do you mean ‘I suppose?’ and what’s wrong with the Baby Doll you’re wearing!’ Gina asked in a questioning tone. ‘I designed all of them specially for you from the description I was given and they all fit perfectly and look as I said stunning on you!  So, what’s the problem?’ 

‘They all seem to show a great deal of leg.  The other three have slits up to the thigh and well perhaps the Baby Doll is more suited from someone much younger.  I feel a little like a fool in it at my age,’ she answered in an embarrassed voice again not liking the sound of her own voice. 

‘These negligees were created to take advantage of and show off one of your best assets, namely your legs!  Claire said they were gorgeous and she was right!  My designs just accentuate them and more importantly allow you the freedom to use them, when and if the need arose especially in the Baby Doll!’ Gina said with a smile. 

Mrs. Hawthorne trusted no one, except Claire and by extension anyone Claire trusted she did also.  She looked at herself in the mirror, tensed and posed a little before smiling.  ‘More ammunition for the arsenal,’ she smiled. 

‘I’m glad that’s settled.  Any longer and you’d have missed your plane.  Now change and I’ll wrap these for you,’ Gina said. 

Claire sidled over to Gina as Mrs. Hawthorne left for the change room.  ‘This is all off the record Gina,’

‘I gathered as much.’ 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

 ’Do you think she suspects anything?’ 

’No, she just sees this as a chance to regain her past glory, power and position within D.O.O.M.’ 

I would also like to point out that she has so far managed to defeat three of our assassins and Nancy may well be the fourth why waste a talented asset like her?’ 

’Because she’s the lynchpin holding it all together and if we can just manage to pull that pin out well need I say more!’ 

’Given what we know about her less than honest financial dealings with D.O.O.M. I’m surprised you didn’t put a bullet in her head during the conversation!’ 

No, this way she gets to die one way or the other, the irony was too much to pass up!  Besides, she’s old and near the end and a used-up asset is no longer valuable to an employer!’ 

They both laughed at that. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Nancy read over the information she’d been provided with carefully studying each detail and reading between the lines to tease out other things that may have been missed in the past.  The woman was impressive and no doubt formidable given her recent successes again D.O.O.M. but Nancy knew no one was unbeatable it just took the right tactic to secure victory. 

 The Assassinatrix stretched one leg 90 degrees up the wall as she thought.  She reached up, cupped the underside of the foot with her hand and leaned inward feeling her body release its tension.  She’d always kept herself in good condition, even after she’d been made a D.O.O.M. Field Director.  Her sudden fall from grace had forced her to pay even more attention to that now.  She’d gone from being in good condition to superbly conditioned and toned during her second career at D.O.O.M. surprising everyone and keeping herself alive in the process! 

At forty-seven she still turned heads, completely around!  Flawless smooth wrinkle free skin, long luxuriant legs, a firm flat stomach, small round breasts, a firm compact ass, beautiful hair and a classic French beauties face were just part of the outward allure!  Her sex appeal, style and grace were all bred from her inward confidence!  She’d possessed it when she was younger, forgotten and almost lost it as she worked her way up the ladder, but thankfully, for her, she’d managed to rescue it and build it up to new heights! 

Her target eluded her as to how to accomplish her death.  The more she studied it the further away she got from an answer.  Frustrated with her lack of progress she shoved it aside and went on to more mundane predictable matters, namely packing. 

At least the Philippines is a known quantity in this equation,’ she said to herself.  ‘And a wonderfully exotic spot,’ she added.  She checked and double-checked her clothes and various other items before pausing on the last small item.  She’d only used it once before and even then, she was nervous, but it had proved to be the difference.  ‘It’s amazing that something so tiny can be so deadly!’ she said letting her pink bikini drop into the suitcase. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

‘We have a complication to the plan?’ 

‘Shall I guess or are you going to tell me,’ he said caustically.

 

‘Mrs. Hawthorne’ 

‘Well I’d say that’s a complication all right but it’s now also an opportunity to expand and grow the plan!  Wouldn’t you say?’

 

‘I don’t think Nancy or any agent we have is capable of all three of them on the same assignment!’ 

‘No, I agree.  She needs help.  Let’s change the game a little.  Lure her away and into a trap and tell Nancy one of her targets has been changed, send her all we have on that woman, Mrs. Hawthorne!  

The trap I’ll leave to you! I trust you’ve already arranged one for our Assassinatrix should she succeed?’ 

He nodded and smiled.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Mrs. Hawthorne was thankful for the open-air jeep as it sped along the coast road away from the heat and pollution of Manila.  Well at least the pollution, the heat was still with her, but thanks to the jeep it was temporarily held at bay.  Her white cotton dress and halter clung damply to her drawing leering backward glances from the driver via the rear-view mirror.  Teasingly she pulled the shoulder straps of the halter a little farther away from her neck and raised her skirt just a little!  The jeep jumped forward as the driver’s foot spasmed on the gas pedal from the sight in his mirror! 

‘She had only agreed to this meeting out of trust and friendship and the understanding that she was not joining C.O.I.L.  Besides I need a vacation,’ she told herself again for what must have been the thousandth time hoping this time would convince her. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

‘Ok I’m convinced!’ she said closing the door to her luxury hut nestled amongst the palm trees at water edge.  

A big beautiful teak floored main room, complete with wet bar and a lounging area for you and your guests, off of which was the large bedroom and ensuite.  French doors, one set in the bedroom and two in the main room led out to a full wrap around deck that on one side the water lapped at invitingly.  The bed was a carved mahogany four poster bed complete with the draped mosquito netting.  The bathroom had a bath more than big enough for two, a Jacuzzi and an all angles shower. 

 

‘I think I’m going to enjoy this,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said. 

The eye came off the telescope as the woman picked up the binoculars and moved as her object of interest moved into the bedroom.  Nancy took a seat, carefully placed on her deck so as to hide her, but not obstruct her view, got comfortable and watched the woman slip out of her clothes.  Her information was vastly outdated, this was not the woman the dossier said she was, she was vastly different!  Cool, sexy, delicious!  A pair of very shapely and undoubtedly very fatal legs, wonderful hips, back and shoulders and fantastic full firm breasts.  It was the overall package, the sculpted physique that was different.  She became aware of her hand that had unconsciously slipped under her sarong and between her thighs.  She left it there and returned to the woman who was now stretching her body and dancing it to a rhythm Nancy couldn’t hear but began to match with her hand!  She watched the woman flex and strain her body that was quickly becoming slick with sweat from her workout.  Nancy’s hips were now moving almost imperceptibly with her hands and her mind began to wander, she fought the urge, knew she should stop, but kept on going her physical actions mingling with her fantasy ones about what this woman would feel like!  She gave in closed her eyes and leaned back! 

‘We finished now!’ 

Nancy jolted out of her daydream and starred in the direction of the voice. 

‘Anything else Miss Nancy before we leave?’

 

‘No that will be all.  You and your sister can leave,’ Nancy said in an irritated voice that came more from having her pleasure interrupted than being caught. 

When the girls had left Nancy hurriedly put the glasses back up her face, but the woman was gone and the moment was lost. 

‘C’est la vie,’ she sighed.  ‘They say the best fantasy is an unfulfilled one.  But, perhaps if I’m lucky I can fulfil this one when I meet her face to face!’ 

 

I am indebted to the classic Kung Fu movie

The Five Deadly Venom’s for inspiration

 

A secret admirer is a nice thing to have at any age, but not when their intentions are of a sinister nature and Nancy’s intentions were clearly of that nature!  Until D.O.O.M.’s plan to separate one of the women from the other two was put in place and activated she spent her days lurking in the shadowy background watching Mrs. Hawthorne.  She had already chosen her method of execution for her original target, but this new woman presented an unknown. 

 

From the comfort of the veranda of her hut she watched the woman’s morning workout, only after she’d managed to shoe away her two ever-present housemaids who seemed to be fascinated with her. 

From her hidden preview, she watched her opposite number pull and extend her toned body in wonderful contortive moves.   Nancy noted the woman’s suppleness and power, especially her legs, those were attractive, almost inviting in their desire to be touched. 

‘Soft to the touch but fatally embracing once triggered,’ she thought.  ‘The trick is not to allow her to pull the trigger!’

 

She followed her to the pool and beach, keeping out her sight all the time either in a closed cabana or just under cover within the foliage where the forest met the beach.  Her elegant, sexily cut one-piece suits displayed her seductive body to perfection and she had no trouble attracting glances and stealing male admirers away from much younger women, much to their consternation!  Her evening and casual clothes all had the same air about them, style and sex appeal.  The only place Nancy couldn’t observe her was when she had her daily meetings with the other two. 

On the afternoon of the third day she received the long waited for e-mail informing her the separation plan had just been put in motion.  She closed her laptop with a smile, set it on the table below, reclined in her twine hammock and thought once again about Mrs. Hawthorne. 

‘I can overcome her power and suppleness,’ Nancy thought.  ‘I’ve done it before and on much younger opponents, but it could take hours just to subdue her and hours more to kill her and one slip,’ she let the thought trail off.  She’d read her dossier; Mrs. Hawthorne had made an annoying habit out of escaping tight traps and killing D.O.O.M. agents.  Frustrated she rolled out of the hammock and began to pace along her veranda then it came to her!  ‘If I want to overcome her strengths maybe I need to weaken them delicately over time,’ she spoke in a sexy voice as she picked up her laptop and searched D.O.O.M.’s database until she found the reference she wanted.  Several hours and numerous arcane searches’ later she found what she wanted. 

‘Delectable and deadly!’ she hissed. ‘Just my style!’  She began her preparations for her visit to Mrs. Hawthorne’s hut that night. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

‘Don’t worry about things here, there going very well.  We’ve established a level of trust with each other all around, the rest will be simple.  You need to focus on meeting our contact in Manila and obtaining the software.  Don’t worry,’ she said again anticipating yet another interruption.  ‘Just come back with the software by the end of the week and we’ll pick it up from there.  Now go and please as always be careful!’ 

* * * * * * * * * * *

Nancy had waited over a half-hour after Mrs. Hawthorne’s hut had gone dark before she decided it was time to put her plan and body into action.  Wrapping a piece of black mosquito netting loosely about her naked torso she silently slipped from her hut and slithered through the jungle by the waters edge to the veranda of her targets hut!  The Assassinatrix landed whisper quite on the teak deck and padded just as noiselessly to the open French doors.  Nancy delicately parted the gauzy netting covering the doors and moved towards the bed where the nude body of Mrs. Hawthorne lay uncovered sleepily breathing.  The D.O.O.M. agent unwrapped the netting from her body as she moved across the cool teak floor her own naked form illuminated by the moon as she stepped from shadow to light and back into shadow as she pulled back the gauze and slipped inside! 

Carefully she leaned over and placed her hands in position millimetres above the woman’s skin who Nancy could see was subconsciously suspecting something.  Mrs. Hawthorne’s eyes flashed open a second later in alarm, but half a second too late!  The assassinatrix’s nails thrust inward on Mrs. Hawthorne’s skin and stuck in place!  Mrs. Hawthorne’s mouth hung open and twitched slightly as she tried to yell but nothing came out and to her alarm her body wouldn’t move either.  Nancy smiled as she climbed onto the bed and straddled her target their hips coming together. 

‘My nails Mrs. Hawthorne have quite a bite to them, don’t they?’ Nancy whispered in her opponent’s ear as she came forward pressing herself onto the woman.  ‘A special file of mine creates a micro barb on each nail, when compressed against the skin they sink in and lock in place until I decide to release them.  Pressed against the correct nerve endings they immobilise in instantly!  My name’s Nancy Prud’homme, D.O.O.M. Assassinatrix and you’re my next victim!’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne was helpless beneath this woman, unable to move or scream for help!  ‘She’s won round one!’ she thought.  ‘I need to wait for a break and make my move,’ she tried to convince herself as she glanced at the well-toned body above her. 

‘I’ve been studying you for several days, watching every move of your wonderful body trying to figure out a way to kill you.  I knew quickly was out of the question given this lethal body you have so I decided on a slow death!  Would you like me to tell you, hmmm!’ Nancy cooed hotly in her ear before pulling up on her body to look her in the face. 

‘It’s called The Five Deadly Venom’s.  They’re made up of the scorpion, snake, centipede, toad and lizard!  Each one is made up of two parts, one a poison and two a special hold applied to the victim!  Both the poison and the holds I apply have a cumulative nature, once the fifth element of both is administered the victim dies within several hours!  Now here’s the best part!  Each night for the next five nights, starting tonight, I’ll be visiting you to add one more element and you’ll be helpless to stop me and in the morning, you’ll remember nothing of our encounters!  You see on top of being a poison it also acts as a memory block activated by me at the end of each encounter!’ Nancy smiled.  ‘Now let’s begin your execution Mrs. Hawthorne with a kiss!’ 

Nancy’s body converged with her victim’s again as she took the woman’s open mouth in hers, parting her lips to match those of her paralysed foe!  The Assassinatrix expertly and tenderly moved her lips and her stung foes about, opening and closing her mouth as she slipped her lips about!  Tentatively the D.O.O.M. agent unhooked her nails and Mrs. Hawthorne’s lips responded, as she knew they would. 

Unable or unwilling to pull away Mrs. Hawthorne found herself hungrily kissing Nancy, their tongues flicking into each another’s like striking snakes!  Nancy rolled her sticky lips fluidly about the woman both clearly enjoying the others skills until Mrs. Hawthorne found her body growing sluggish; she’d been seduced!  Nancy kept up the kiss for several more minutes; her lips becoming more active as those of her opponent's diminished.  The Assassinatrix ended the kiss smiled and then slowly nipped her opponent’s lips with touch up kisses to finish her! 

‘You know Mrs. Hawthorne,’ she said kissing her charge in between each word.  ‘You were a wonderful kisser that is until I’m afraid the scorpion venom in my lipstick numbed your body!  I read in your dossier drugged lipsticks are a favourite device with you, me also!  In a battle of venomous serpents, such as us, it’s always best to bite first!’ she softly said to one final kiss.  ‘I gave you the opportunity to escape when I retracted my nails but my touch was just too sweet I suppose?’ Nancy hissed with delight. 

‘Now to part two of our first encounter,’ Nancy said in a silky voice. 

She rolled off the stiff woman and gently rolled her over on her back.  She retrieved the black netting spun it at the ends into a long thin rope and slowly tied it loosely about Mrs. Hawthorne’s naked body in a seductive manner that stimulated the deadened woman to Nancy’s delight!  She rolled her over again and saw the results; Mrs. Hawthorne’s nipples were erect! 

Stung by the Nancy’s venomous lipstick Mrs. Hawthorne could only watch her assassin.  ‘God, I want to touch and feel her!’ she thought. ‘Before I kill her!’ she added after a long pause. 

Nancy stretched her body adding elements to her tease, in front of the woman before approaching with an evil sexy grin that really turned on Mrs. Hawthorne.  Slowly and with great care the Assassinatrix slid her feet up and down the legs of her opponent before feathering them softly into the fabric and working it about them.  Nancy’s long legs coiled perfectly about the woman as she moved herself deeper into the hold, her lean calves and taut, trained thighs stuck and pinned Mrs. Hawthorne into position!  The D.O.O.M. woman rolled and turned her prey as she wove her upper body into the trap the hot night mingling their sweaty nude forms together as Nancy entangled her victim! 

‘Delicious trap isn’t it Mrs. Hawthorne?  I can see you appreciate my expert talents!  Just a few more turns and twists and there I have you.  Hold on!’ Nancy cautioned as she rolled them both over suspending Mrs. Hawthorne above her! 

Unable to scream Mrs. Hawthorne’s mind exploded in light shards of pain that shot from one hemisphere to the other and back again!  Nancy twisted and moved her legs and arms convulsing the hanging woman’s body! Slowly the trapped woman felt the sharp pangs of distress leave her body as if all was normal once more. 

‘The pain has left you Mrs. Hawthorne but your ordeal is not over yet!’ she heard Nancy’s breathy voice comment.  ‘We have several more hours together before our first session ends and I release you.’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne recognised a deadly predator and Nancy was all that attractively wrapped up in a woman’s body.  Seductively the Assassinatrix moved her arms and legs shimming the gauzy netting back and forth about her victims dangling form!  The hung woman heroically resisted the touch of the scorpion woman and her deadly sting!  Nancy smiled from below and probed deeper with her satin strokes, her long legs brushing Mrs. Hawthorne’s gams while her arms touched and probed her upper body as the fabric worked other parts of the paralysed woman! 

‘I admire your will power Mrs. Hawthorne. The information in your dossier was correct about that!

Tell me though have you ever faced a woman with my years of experience and patience?  I don’t spin my webs quickly; no, I prefer to go slow making sure I construct it for the type of prey I’m after!  I’ll slowly cocoon you in my trap over time, securing you with my sticky death threads until escape from my parlour is quite impossible!’ Nancy’s velvety soft voice spoke.  

Moonlight illuminated the mosquito netting shrouding the two women inside the bed as Nancy danced her scorpion hold about her elevated victim.  The ethereal scene was so erotic in appearance for both women as each could see the other, Nancy watched Mrs. Hawthorne from the ceiling mirror and Mrs. Hawthorne witnessed her dominatrix from the headboard mirror! 

Despite her helpless predicament, Mrs. Hawthorne was totally aroused and turned on by a combination of Nancy’s touch and the touch of the netting and as well, somewhat perversely, by the hold she was trapped in and its erotic nature! 

‘If I could just move or if she’d tilt me back a little more I could go on the offensive and attack her body with the touch of my lips.  She’s hot and sweaty, I can feel the heat coming off of her and see the pools of moisture on her magnificent body and the sheets!’ Mrs. Hawthorne thought as she tried to distract her mind from Nancy’s attack.  ‘Her beautifully trained experienced body would feel perfect trapped in my Weaving Woman.  She’ll falter soon and then I’ll slip this trap and we’ll begin again on equal terms but we’ll end on mine!’ 

Nancy kept up the attack as she watched Mrs. Hawthorne in the overhead mirror.  ‘She’s desperate to get me but her body is too deep in the grip of the poison.  She’s overheating even now her bodies drenched in sweat and glowing hot but still she’s resisting! What a woman! Under different circumstances an encounter with her would be most pleasurable!  She thinks I’ll falter due to the heat, but thanks to years in the Congo she’s wrong!’ 

Nancy kept up her attack about the blazing drenched and scorching body of Mrs. Hawthorne.  The suspended woman kept resisting fighting her entangling capture with everything she had!  The Assassinatrix let her resist as she worked her body about her victim and slipped the fabric and herself into striking position! 

The D.O.O.M. woman raised her legs letting the material and Mrs. Hawthorne’s leg’s slip down to her thighs as she cupped the trapped woman’s chin with her hands and held it firm!  The entwined woman watched in the mirror as Nancy’s long toned calves swung down one after the other her pointed toes striking softly into her tits, each rib on the way down, her mound then the final strike and thrust to her pussy with one foot.  The lean spare hot body of Nancy displayed perfectly in the mirror for Mrs. Hawthorne to watch.  She thought about closing her eyes but couldn’t, she knew she was defeated, both by her opponent and by her own twisted eroticism! 

She watched and felt Nancy’s sexily shaped and sinewy calf snake and slither down the come to rest perfectly against her clitoris!  Nancy smiled at Mrs. Hawthorne then very delicately moved her toe back and forth rubbing it over and around the ever-hardening nodule!  Unable to pull away she mentally battled her attacker using her experience to delay the coming orgasm! 

‘Cum Mrs. Hawthorne! The scorpion’s tail has struck and embedded in you!  Even you cannot resist my sting!’ Nancy soothed. 

Mrs. Hawthorne gave in after a moment and came gloriously, small gasps escaping from her as she revelled in delight.  Nancy pulled out and rapidly stung up her body in reverse order from before.  Then she lowered the exhausted pleasured woman into her body, rolled her over on side and disentangled their bodies.  Gently she rolled Mrs. Hawthorne onto her back once more. 

‘The caressing and the netting coupled with my strokes stimulate and open hidden glands in your body.  My rapid foot strikes do the same and the orgasm at the end allows the poison to flow into them were it sits awaiting the others to mix with and kill you Mrs. Hawthorne.  I will be back tomorrow for another session and you will remember nothing of this night everything will be as normal when you wake up.  Blink your eyes if you understand?’ Nancy whispered.  When she saw the acknowledgement, she smiled leaned over and kissed her victim good night.

 

She took the netting, wrapped it lightly around her hot exhausted body and slipped from the hut just as silently as she had arrived but this time she was observed doing so! 

Nancy slipped back into her hut hot, tried and dripping sweat but successful on her first night’s sojourn.  Tomorrow night she’d return and apply the second venom, the snake, to Mrs. Hawthorne but for now all she wanted was a shower and rest, tomorrow she had a big day planned! 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

‘Excuse me ladies, would you mind if another woman joined your table for breakfast this morning?  She just arrived at the resort and is all alone.  Of course, I understand if you say no,’ the Beach Captain said as his darted to the side to indicate the person he was asking about. 

The two women barely moved their eyes but took in the woman before they looked at each other and then back to him with simultaneous acknowledgements.  He smiled, thanked them and left. 

‘Why not our business is I think concluded, the rest of our stay while we wait for Claire to return purely pleasure,’ the one said to the other as the woman approached their poolside table.  

‘Thank you so much!  My names Chantal Govan,’ Nancy said extending her hand. 

‘Pleasure to meet you Chantal.  I’m Catherine Wycliffe and my friend is Mrs. Hawthorne.  Please sit down and join us.’ 

Nancy took mental notes while remaining neutral and cool even as she took the chair next to Mrs. Hawthorne.  She noted both women had sized her up as she walked towards even though they appeared not to be looking at her.  She knew they would be, it was second nature and she’d given them no choice in the matter.  She’d worn her pink bikini under a see-through mesh top that stopped at her hips displaying her long legs perfectly!  The D.O.O.M. agent noted both the women took longer than normal looks at her body!  Mrs. Hawthorne, she knew about, but Catherine was a blank page, that was until the look she gave Nancy!

 

The Assassinatrix chatted pleasantly with both of them, giving them equal time in conversation and eye contact while she assessed Catherine.  Nancy knew she was sixty-one and a former agent with MI-6 with an excellent record.  She’d retired as an active field agent at 42 and then worked internally until accepting a position at the newly formed C.O.I.L.  Her dossier contained nothing of her skills, only her height, 5’, 4’ and weight 105 pounds the rest was left to Nancy to draw her own conclusions.  The C.O.I.L. woman had salt and pepper shoulder length black hair, completely becoming and attractive.  Her skin was clear and remarkably wrinkle free, small cherub lips, deep dark black eyes and high cheek bones set off a striking face!  She wore a loose-fitting cover up cut elegantly down the sides giving to legs freedom to escape and cross over each other.  A quick look on her walk to the table confirmed the woman still worked out and could dine out on her legs if she needed to! 

Nancy kept up her charade during breakfast always having a ready answer for the subtle questions the two women innocuously posed.  Their questions, although honey coated were designed to stick and hold her in their trap.  The D.O.O.M. spy neatly stepped around all the bait they supplied and was equally careful not to overplay her hand.  To that end she down played her sex appeal and dancing eyes during the conversations they shared.  Neither of her two opposite numbers appeared concerned about her and Nancy had been around long enough to know when a person was faking concern. 

‘Thank you for a wonderful morning ladies,’ Nancy said. I’ll be at the beach working on my tan if you care to join me.’ 

‘A most interesting woman and so much more than meets the eye, although speaking for myself,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said.  ‘That’s intriguing as well!’ 

‘Yes,’ was all Catherine offered in a tone her breakfast companion picked up on. 

‘Would you like me to find out more about her?’ Mrs. Hawthorne asked. 

‘Yes, I think that would be a good idea, but I thought a position at COIL for you was not in the cards.’ Catherine smiled as she took a sip of her tea. 

‘No, it isn’t, I prefer my present status as an independent woman adventurer.  But I must admit underneath that exterior is a hidden truth that we need to know for both out sakes,’ Mrs. Hawthorne smiled back as she got up and headed in the direction of Nancy. 

 Nancy removed her earpiece, pulled the cord a little and let it retract back into her compact before she closed the mirrored top and snapped it shut and placed it inside her beach bag.  The range was short and the life span limited to only a few minutes but the Nano transmitters in her clear lip gel had done their job and supplied her with the information she needed to play along with the two! 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Claire stretched in her naked body gloriously in the afternoon sun arching it to an erect point!  She’d done her two hours of cardio and was now in working on her strength and flexibility.  The droplets of sweat pouring off of her as she pulled her lithe body from position to position. 

The exchange of the Intel was to take place that evening at the home of Inez Sunga during one of her lavish and famous parties.  Among Manila society it was considered a real cop to be invited to the home of this powerful financier as it opened doors.  Claire just wanted the Intel, the party was bonus, she would stay and enjoy herself until it was fashionable to leave.  The spy pulled herself into a lotus position and began to meditate as she let her body relax. 

*************

The cool water was welcomed by her body, as was the moisturising lotion she applied once she’d dried herself.  Claire had chosen a white silk evening gown with a plummeting front and back giving her a distracting appeal from both points and an almost illegal slit up the thigh for her leg to play hide and seek with!  She applied the final touches, checked the mirror and left ready for the party. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Mrs. Hawthorne let the warm white sands ooze between her toes as she walked down the path towards the beach.  She twisted and turned a few times as the path followed the contours of the land until she emerged on the beach and saw Nancy. 

‘I decided to take you up on your offer Chantal,’ she said. 

‘I’m glad I was getting rather lonely here and was just about to leave, but with the arrival of such stimulating company that prospect is no longer,’ she smiled.

  

Mrs. Hawthorne undid her wrap and smiled.  ‘Well this is a nude beach is it not?’ she smiled. 

‘It is,’ said Nancy nonplussed by the woman’s exquisite body as she turned her head to the sky once more. 

Mrs. Hawthorne began to slowly and seductively rub her body with suntan lotion.  Her hands working into every crevice and curve of her form, oiling it with a glowing slickness!  She knew she had Chantal’s attention; just the slightest pinprick of her nipples was pushing through her top. 

‘Would you please do my back for Chantal?’ she asked in a sexy voice that left no misunderstanding as to her game. 

‘I’m afraid I can’t Mrs. Hawthorne.  I’m sorry, you see unfortunately I have very sensitive skin to certain chemicals and I must be very carefully what I touch.  I’m afraid your lotion is one I can’t!  I do apologise,’ Nancy said slyly. 

The experienced woman shrugged it off saying she understood fully.  She lay down on the lounger and positioned her body just so.  Nancy took note and smiled inwardly even as she battled her desires for control.  If she hadn’t initiated her plan already she would have taken this woman now, first for pleasure and then for business! 

Mrs. Hawthorne twisted and repositioned her naked form several times to no effect on the woman.  Nancy aware of her raging desires, but more aware of Mrs. Hawthorne’s intentions kept her body prone and in a defensive position!  They talked pleasantly as Mrs. Hawthorne tried to use in wiles and charms to get the woman to drop her defences. 

‘All I need is two seconds of weakness and you’ll be mine!’ she thought but Nancy innocently wouldn’t allow it. 

After several hours, Nancy got up and stretched her arms above her body letting her companion she the target she had been denied in full splendour. 

‘I must be going, thank you for a wonderful afternoon and maybe we’ll see each other again?’ she said picking up her beach bag and starting up the path. 

‘We certainly will my dear woman!’ Mrs. Hawthorne said as she watched Nancy’s ass wiggle as she disappeared around a corner. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Claire’s long, bronzed and oiled legs uncoiled from the backseat of the limo, stretched forth and secured a footing on the ground. The rest of her equally scrumptious body flowed out as some of the crowd stopped and looked. She smiled as she gracefully acknowledged the stares of some of the guests on her way to the door. The rising steps provided further displays of her gorgeous legs for those unfortunate not to have seen them in the first instance and for those lucky enough to gain a second glimpse. 

‘Welcome Claire,’ Inez said. ‘Welcome to my home,’ Mrs. Sunga added as she greeted the spy.

Claire noted she was a woman in her early fifties with a matronly, yet still sexy body. Her hostess was dressed in a scoop- topped black sequinned dress, which revealed ample décolletage. The outfit was cut just at the knee. In stylish heels, her full, round legs were displayed to perfection. ‘Let me introduce you to some people.’

 

Inez took Claire by the arm and led the agent around the party. ‘The exchange will take place in that room at eight,’ she said quietly, giving a small casual nod towards a door in a corner. She handed the spy off to a group of people and made her way back to the door to greet and mingle. 

Claire did her best to join in the festivities, to kill time until the appointed hour arrived. It wasn’t long before she saw Inez making her way to the previously indicated door. Claire excused herself and strode over to the corner. She opened the door and stepped inside, closing it behind her. 

Inez smiled as Claire entered then slowly lifted the corner of her dress to reveal powerful thighs to go along with her calves. Claire was puzzled, until Inez continued, slipping a hand up her dress to pull out a small gun! 

‘I’m afraid there’s been a slight change in plans, my dear. Instead of obtaining the Intel, I have obtained you for D.O.O.M.!  My only regret is that I will not be finishing you myself!  I would like to see you try and escape my legs!’

 

‘Please, be my guest,’ Claire taunted, hoping to draw the woman close enough to disarm her. 

‘No, I’m afraid my wish will have to go unfilled, but, fortunately, that doesn’t mean I won’t be able to enjoy your death first hand!’ Sunga pushed a button on the wall. The muzzle of her gun never wavered from the centre of Claire’s chest. 

The hum of motors heralded the rise of panels along the walls of the room. Revealed was a room covered in mirrors! Even the facade of the ceiling gave way to a reflective surface. 

‘The mirrors are two-way for two reasons: One, so my guests can enjoy an evening’s entertainment, watching you struggle; and two, so you and the adversaries you’ll soon meet can observe your death as well! 

You’ll note that each mirror is of a different reflective magnitude, allowing both you and your opponents the chance to look at each other in every detail!’ 

At that precise moment, the door opened and four young girls entered. Each were wearing loose-fitting, flower-print sarongs. 

‘Your opponents!’ Inez smiled.  ‘Oh, and don’t let their age fool you. I assure you, they are quite lethal! Now, please remove your clothes, Miss Baxter . . . and your accessories,’ Inez said with a wave of her gun. 

‘Not a chance,’ Claire answered defiantly. ‘If you think I’m going to put on a show for you and your sick guests–’ 

‘I urge you to reconsider,’ Inez said levelly. ‘My orders are to kill you and I can do that much more efficiently with this gun. You can’t escape a bullet, but your track record indicates you have a remarkable ability to get out of such situations as I am offering you. From your perspective, the choice would seem clear.’ 

Claire stared at Mrs. Sunga for a long moment. Then she shrugged her shoulders and simply said, ‘Alright.’ She began to disrobe. 

A female servant entered and collected Claire’s discarded items.  The girls then slowly stripped off their sarongs and handed them to the servant one at a time as she passed before exiting. 

Claire glanced from one girl to the next, making observations.  All appeared to be about eighteen or so with long, shiny, black hair.  Each had a pretty face that would grow only more beautiful with age. They all possessed slim, angular bodies with small firm breasts, petite, but perky. Every girl featured thin hips and small firm butts that supported long, tapering legs. 

‘Where have I seen this before?’ she mused.

‘Your fate will be sealed, quite literally, by and in these four girls, my dear.  Oh, and I know all about your escape from Wen and Di, but they were only two girls – not four!  Besides, these little ones will provide you with a much more interesting and tactile challenge,’ Inez hissed and she slithered about the room of mirrors, never failing to keep her gun trained on Claire.  ‘You see, Claire, these girls practice an ancient Filipino women’s technique called ‘The Four Petal Orchid.’’ 

There was no doubt Inez greatly enjoyed explaining to Claire exactly what was going to happen. 

‘Each girl represents a petal of the flower. Each petal will be inserted into you. When all the petals are in place, they will form a complex body knot. Slowly, the knot will be drawn painfully tighter around you. Finally, each petal will be slowly extracted, leaving your limbs secured about 

themselves! The last extraction will leave you entangled in your own body. Then, you’ll only have about thirty minutes to live . . . an extremely painful thirty minutes!’ 

‘They have to catch me first,’ Claire pointed out. 

‘Yes,’ Inez admitted, without further comment. She strolled to the door, opened it and paused for a final bit of instruction to her young charges. ‘Kill her slowly, girls . . . and do enjoy yourselves while doing so!’ 

The door closed and the girls began to circle, the look of a pack of hungry wolves in their eyes.  

Claire darted here and there, trying to manoeuvre them into a line, so she could strike several at once. They, however, were too well trained to fall for such a tactic. 

The five naked females slowly moved around the room. Claire was ever vigilant, looking for a place to attack, but found none. The nubile foursome closed around her until; finally, one darted from behind and landed a solid punch to her lower back before dancing back into the circle. Next an attack came from both sides as two girls levelled sidekicks that missed. Claire jumped up, split her legs and snapped them both in the back of the head, sending them rolling away for just a second before they popped to their feet and reformed the circle of death. 

The five nude beauties stalked each other for a long time. Brief tussles were interspersed with flurries of frantic activity. Neither side allowed the other to gain the upper hand. 

‘She’ll make a mistake soon, my girls are merely tiring her out,’ Inez told her enthralled guests as they watched through the two-way mirror. 

Try as she might, Claire couldn’t get to the door. If she could get out of the room, she felt sure in the crowd and confusion she could get away. Although she didn’t let it show, she was desperate to escape the girls. She knew if they all four got a hold of her at once; she would be buried in their bodies! 

Outnumbered and having to react to four opponents, Claire began to tire. Sensing her fatigue, the girls closed their circle around her, until she was defending blows from all angles. A double feint caused her to overreact, just slightly. It was all the opening the bronze-skinned teens needed. 

Three of them seized Claire’s limbs, holding the spy erect and helpless. The fourth girl stepped in front of Claire and slipped her arms around the spy’s waist. She smiled as she looked up at Claire. Then she twisted her slim, powerful hips and slammed it into Claire’s mound! The girl assessed the effect of her first strike, before ramming home another blow! 

Just as suddenly as she was taken, Claire was released.  She staggered from the hip blows, but still managed to defend herself a little, even scoring a few hits of her own.  She tried for the door. Hand-springing forward, she launched a double kick at two of her foes.  Exhausted, she missed badly.  The girls grabbed one leg each, crashed her to the ground and splayed her out as their compatriots grabbed her arms.  The spread-eagled spy bounced and twisted helplessly in their grip, unable to break free. 

‘The beginning of the end for Miss Baxter,’ Inez delightedly proclaimed to her guests. 

The girls’ bodies hungrily devoured the spy, as they seductively began inserting themselves into her . . . and into each other! Claire didn’t dare move a muscle, as that would only help them entangle her all the more. 

Instead, she was reduced to watching and feeling the nymphs work their deadly skills about her. 

Long, thin legs and arms caressed and probed about her and each other as they worked into place. 

Each girl had applied an alluring scent to her body before the fight that overwhelmed the odour of their sweat. Now, in close contact, the perfumes bit into Claire, arousing her senses and weakening her resolve. 

Claire quickly learned there was a sexual component to ‘The Four Petal Orchid.’ Two hot tongues found each of her nipples. Slow circles of their tongues and pulls from their lips quickly made them hard. Claire fought the lust building within her. The girls, despite their age, had excellent technique; however, so far, it wasn’t enough to bring her to orgasm . . . 

. . . but they were far from finished. 

Their supple frames wired into her, increasing her sexual tension. Their hard, smooth bodies slid over and around her in a twisting vortex of deadly sinuous flesh.  Slowly the girls leaned inward and kissed her delicately on the cheek one by one. 

‘We let scent mix together, Miss Spy,’ said one. 

‘Arouse you,’ said another. 

‘Make you helpless,’ said the third. 

‘Then, we let knot do rest,’ adding the fourth with a giggle from all of them. Then they all became still. 

‘My girls will hold Miss Baxter in that position for several hours, letting their scents and the fiery cauldron of their body heat make her completely susceptible to their touch,’ Inez explained. ‘Those of you who want to watch can, but, if you wish, I will summon you back when things get more interesting.’ 

Inez smiled as nobody left. 

* * *

‘Why don’t you move, Miss Spy?’ 

‘This way, we entangle you more slowly.’  

‘Either way, you helpless in our bodies.’ 

‘Maybe you like feel of us too much?’ 

Claire, still in the quartet's grip as they talked, raced her mind back to her encounter with Wen and Di in the hope something that happened then could help her here. She looked in the mirrors, side and above, to gain a perspective of her situation.  She was greeted at all angles by the nest of limbs and the intricacies of the knot in which she was trapped. She was continually aroused by the tether of skin entwined about her frame and the beautiful, but deadly girls, who consumed her. Seeing it all in the reflections only added to the fire within. 

‘You don’t need move for us to kill you, Miss Spy.’ 

‘Maybe she think because she big and strong, her muscles resist us?’ 

‘Not true, Miss Spy. We kill female bodybuilder last week with same knot.’ 

‘If she not escape with her strength, what chance you have?’ 

Claire began to feel the young minxes’ scents work on her, as the lithesome girls’ knot began to heat her up even more. Her greasy, sweat sheened body began to weaken. Her brain became fuzzy from the scents that flowed from her circle of ‘admirers.’  Her head tilted back and her mouth opened for air as she tried to breathe that way to avoid taking the perfumed fragrance into her brain. One of the girls leaned forward and lingeringly toyed with her lips, until Claire began to respond and was forced to breathe the poison in again. 

‘You good kisser, Miss Spy.’ 

‘She very hot.’ 

‘We told kill slowly, so not yet.’ 

‘Miss Spy wonderful to touch, very soft.’ 

The C.O.I.L. agent’s flaming body, fused in their silky grip, was gradually withering under their youthful vigour. Two of the girls slipped an arm free and massaged her pliant, scorching skin, rubbing her own perspiration back into her. They cupped her hard ass in their slick hands, carefully rubbing her before stroking her arms and then . . . her tits! 

‘Why do you not move now, Miss Spy?’ the first girl asked. 

‘Give in,’ the second encouraged. 

‘Let yourself go,’ the third cooed seductively. 

‘You die anyway,’ the fourth stated, ‘might as well relax and enjoy it.’ 

Hot coals of defiance burned in Claire’s eyes. ‘Why don’t you all . . .’ she said breathlessly, ‘go fuck yourselves!’ 

‘No, Miss Spy,’ said the leader. 

Then, all in unison, they declared, ‘We fuck you!’ 

Claire was already erect and excited, but their touch, so insidious for ones so young, destroyed her resolve. A quick, light stroking of her pussy was all that was required to send her over! Claire quivered and moaned as she got her reward, but she paid for her pleasure as the knot pulled inward! 

‘They are something, aren’t they?’ Inez observed to smiles and nods all round. 

The girls pulled inward with a chorus of giggles. They knew, from this point on, the knot would self-tighten around its prey. She was too deeply interwoven into them to escape . . . or even to fight their envelopment.  She watched helplessly in the mirrors as millimetre by millimetre, they closed about her, wrapping her deeper into them. 

Claire felt one girl’s leg slip up between her breasts. Another’s slithered between her butt cheeks and spread open her ass. The breath caught in Claire’s throat. She had never felt a leg there before. The unique pressure against her anus was irresistible. 

Their hard, young bodies were perfect for this type of death. They kissed and rubbed her constantly, stimulating the knot. Their electric touch and fatal beauty worked again and again on her as she achieved orgasm after orgasm, responding in delight to their clinching death. 

The onlookers saw the spy slowly disappear under a wall of coiling, nubile flesh, until only her head was visible!  All around her was a wall of seething, twisting, ever-tightening death, masked in the form of naked girls! 

‘How we feel, Miss Spy?’ 

‘Like four snakes, wrapped about you?’ 

‘You still long way from being free of us!’ 

‘You feel us long time yet!’ 

Claire could feel them enough already, their cling so completely secured that she couldn’t tell where her body ended and theirs took over!  The spy looked into the mirrors again at the erotic scene vortexing around her and instantly regretted it. She lost herself again to lust! Her torrid frame screamed under the blanket of ever debilitating flesh, while erotic thoughts danced unbidden through her mind.

 

As if on cue, the girls began to kiss her, stinging her hot, sticky flesh with even hotter lips and probing tongues!  Claire was overwhelmed by four sets of lips at once. She was rolled her onto her side; her legs spread she was languidly penetrated by the mouths of one of the girls! 

Claire tried to resist the probing tongue as it flicked and darted about her clitoris, but the girl was patient and skilled! Claire’s breathing slowed as the young serpent worked. Suddenly, the girl felt success! This time Claire screamed and convulsed in joy, her glory their triumph as the knot closed even more tightly around her! 

The girl kissed her pussy and nuzzled her, causing an aftershock of pleasure to rock the spy. Then the nature of their entanglement of the spy into their lethal limbs changed. They rolled Claire upright and dug in deep, entertained by her moans of pain. 

‘You finished, Miss Spy!’ 

‘Our sexual touch always fatal.’ 

‘Now you endure many hours of us . . .’ 

‘. . . and pain, ended only by death.’ 

They were right. Claire was pulled apart in the tweeze of their crushing limbs.  The constriction was unremitting; the pain unrelenting.  The spy moaned continuously as the girls casually slipped the knot tighter about their prey.  Claire slumped in the hold and offered no resistance, her body long ago broken by the four deadly girls. 

* * *

Hours later, the first girl leisurely began to pry herself free. ‘Now watch closely,’ Inez instructed behind the glass.

‘This is most interesting.’ 

‘Goodbye, Miss Spy,’ said the leader as she began to pull herself free. 

The torture had been so intense; Claire had forgotten what Inez had said. Now she remembered. Her limbs were to be secured about themselves. Then she was supposed to die. 

Despite herself, Claire was fascinated . . . and also hopeful. ‘Surely, with the girls gone, I can escape any knot they tied me into with my own body . . . Can’t I?’ 

As the first girl left the five-person tangle, the lead torturer pulled Claire's left arm behind the spy's back, then bent it up at the elbow. The other three girls kept her arm exactly where their leader had left it. 

'This isn't so bad,' . . . but Claire knew she was only fooling herself with the optimistic thought. 

The second girl began to extract herself. Claire's right leg was brought up between the spy's breasts, then over her right collarbone and against her neck. With the knee pointing outward and upward, it was then forced down across Claire's back; her ankle laid over her left elbow. For the time being, it was the remaining two girls who kept her leg in this most unnatural position. 

Claire felt sure she could eventually wiggle her left arm free, if this was all there was to it. She worried that her hope was forlorn. After all, her executioners were only half done. 

Now the third girl started to pull out. Claire's right arm was pulled back almost to the point of dislocation. Then her elbow was bent, leaving her right-hand flopping uselessly behind her left shoulder. 

Claire's left hand was stuck between her right upper arm and right lower leg. Her right forearm ran across her right ankle. Her left elbow was already buried under two layers of herself. 

Terror began to well up inside the C.O.I.L. agent. ‘For now, the last girl is the only thing holding my right arm in place, but if she somehow traps it with my left leg!’ 

Claire fell into the pit of despair as the fourth girl did exactly that. Claire's left leg was rolled back, leaving her left breast almost touching her groin. The spy's knee was bent wide of her body. Then the back of her leg was run across the inside of her right forearm, locking the right arm in place. This was only a prelude, though, to the most painful moment of the entire procedure -- the key to locking Claire forever within her own flesh and bone. 

With the other three girls assisting, the last girl began wedging Claire's left ankle into the tiny space among the crook of her right elbow, her right ankle and the inside of her left forearm. There was much grunting, pushing and struggling by the girls. Claire screamed in agony. 

The left ankle went into a space never intended for it to occupy. Claire, supported by the small of her back, feet and elbows, was now completely self-knotted! 

Claire had to fight the urge to panic. In her yoga exercises, she had often tied herself in the classic Human Knot. She had also experimented with the much harder to escape, Solo Position. Neither, however, had felt anything like this. 

Anywhere, everywhere Claire tried to pull or push the knot to loosen it only tightened the bondage elsewhere. The Four Petal Orchid was insidious, ingenious . . . and self-locking. The agent was left in a diabolical endless loop of her own interlocking limbs . . . and in total pain. 

‘Come along, everyone. Shall we view the victim first hand and pay our respects to Miss Baxter?’ Inez laughed as she led them into the room.  ‘Excellent work, girls, as usual,’ she smiled as the girls, each in turn, bent over and kissed Claire before departing. 

The guests were invited to examine the victim and ask questions if they wished. Three or four touched her as if she was a hands-on exhibit. Claire, her left nipple pointing toward her genitals and her butt splayed open, was totally humiliated and silently swore revenge on them all. 

‘Excuse me,’ one of the guests, a tall, round-faced man in his late forties, eventually said. ‘How exactly will she die?’ 

‘What do you mean?’ Inez asked in response, slightly puzzled. 

‘I mean, will she die by strangulation, that is, because she cuts the flow of blood off to her own brain by pressure against her right carotid artery? Or is it that she constricts her own chest so greatly she’ll find it impossible to take in her next breath? Or perhaps she’ll break a rib into her heart? Or maybe the pain will cause her to go into convulsions and snap her neck? Or will she just die of exhaustion or thirst?’ 

‘I don’t know,’ Inez answered pensively. She put a finger to her chin. ‘I know!’ she exclaimed. ‘Let’s ask her!’ She bent over and faced Claire. 

‘Miss Baxter!’ the voice of Mrs. Sunga filled the mirrored room, ‘can you still hear me?! One of my guests is wondering exactly what is going to kill you. Do you have any thoughts on the subject?!’ 

Claire exhausted; hot and knotted, just stared straight ahead, a blank, vacant look of horror frozen on her face. A faint, ‘ . . . uhhh . . . uhhh . . . uhh . . . uh . . .’ was all Claire managed in reply. 

 ‘I’m sorry,’ Sunga said sadly, ‘I’m afraid Miss Baxter is too far gone to engage in her legendary witty repartee.’ Inez’s face brightened. ‘But I will have an autopsy performed. I’m sure that will answer your question.’ 

‘Thank you,’ the man answered, as he continued, spellbound, to watch Claire’s death throes. 

‘Come along everyone, we’ll have champagne while we watch her die,’ Inez called as she escorted them out. They left Claire alone, to watch herself perish in the mirrors. 

******

The night was very hot as Nancy waited for her self-appointed rendezvous with Mrs. Hawthorne. 

Tonight, she applied the second deadly venom, the Snake!  As usual she’d planned in advance and moved into striking distance just after the delectable woman had left for a late dinner with Catherine, now all she had to was wait for her victim to return! 

The D.O.O.M. Assassinatrix listened to the chirping and rustling sounds of the nightlife outside as she waited.  The buzzing of the outside world faded as the sound of footsteps on the gravel path rose above them until they in turn were overtaken by heels on the steps and finally the sound of the screen door closing.  Nancy coiled her naked body in anticipation of her approaching prey as she waited in the dark the sound of heels on wood circling around her until silence. 

Nancy could feel the heat of her quarry from her hiding spot her body alive with sensations that she could only describe as primeval in nature!  The waiting ended slowly, her hiding cavern illuminated by the soft glow of moonlight that streamed in and she rose up to meet its touch. 

A flowing hand emerged just above the lip of the straw basket she’d been concealed in, dancing like the stem of a flower in the soft breeze.   Tentatively her other arm joined it in dance as together they swayed and inched upward her fingers stroking the night air.  Nancy’s head didn’t emerge for many minutes, she built the climax slowly, not wanting to rush, she had most of the night left.  When she finally allowed Mrs. Hawthorne to see her she let the woman take the lead as to what happened next, confident that in the end she would prevail! 

Mrs. Hawthorne, Nancy noted, was wearing a stunning dark green evening gown that beautifully displayed her neck and shoulder and was held together on one shoulder with a pin in the form of a butterfly. 

‘Dressed and accessorised to perfection!’ Nancy thought.  ‘I had hoped for nothing less!’ 

The dancing woman weaved her arms back and forth, close, but never touching her opponent!  

Slowly she came up to full height in the basket, the top of the opening just below the upper reaches of her thigh.  Mrs. Hawthorne seemed entranced in the midst of the swaying nude snakewoman!  She held out her hands for Nancy to take, the dancer moving about them nimbly with wispy touches of future caresses all promised in due time. 

Nancy turned and swayed her body, dancing with her back to her target, arching back to look up at the woman with hungry sexual eyes.  Mrs. Hawthorne slowly felt the touches of Nancy’s skin grow longer and longer against her own until she slithered them up and around the woman!  Mrs. Hawthorne returned the touches as she twisted the soft skin of her arms about her opposite number until she had enough to jerk her close and tighten! 

‘Don’t move if you value your life my venom is rather deadly this evening!’ Mrs. Hawthorne smiled pulling the back of Nancy’s head against the shoulder and placing their cheeks together.  The Assassinatrix watched the woman’s thumb touch a part on a ring she wore on another finger releasing a needle.  ‘One prick of my ring and death is seconds away!’ 

‘What are you doing and who are you?’ Nancy faked convincingly she hoped.  ‘I was only responding to your overtures from this afternoon.  Please don’t kill me!’ she panicked. 

‘Who are you really my little viper?’ Mrs. Hawthorne cooed as she stroked the edge of the ring against Nancy’s skin. 

‘Chantel Govan, tourist!’ Nancy stammered continuing the charade before boldly asking ‘Who and what are you?’ 

‘I’m a woman after the truth about you Chantel Govan!’ 

‘I thought you’d enjoy this!  I was really turned on by your body this afternoon but embarrassed to admit it!  That’s why I left so quickly, I needed time to sort out my emotions!  I wanted you then and there but was afraid we’d be stumbled upon, so I concocted this scene hoping you’d respond!’ Nancy rambled in a frantic voice.  ‘In private and unhurried I hoped we could be leisurely lovers.  If I’ve misinterpreted your earlier movements I apologise!  Please don’t hurt me!’ 

‘I have no intention of doing so my dear,’ Mrs. Hawthorne wooed slipping her ring hand free and running it down Nancy’s side, across her flat stomach and into her bush where she gently stroked the woman. 

Nancy’s body was alive with the eroticism of the moment!  She wasn’t sure which was deadlier the poison or the woman, but she was sure of what to do next!  Slowly she began to move her hips in and out matching the stroking rhythm of Mrs. Hawthorne, both being entranced by the feel of each other. 

Carefully the D.O.O.M. woman turned, slightly at first, testing Mrs. Hawthorne, then finally completely around to face her.  Nancy moved closer and kissed the shoulder of the woman as the poisoned ring continued to stroke her pussy!  The kisses moved up her shoulder as the moist caresses settled into the nape of her neck. 

‘If you going to sting me with your deadly device please let it be there!’ Nancy whispered into her ear rolling her tongue languidly about before sliding over to the other shoulder to repeat the process! 

The snakewoman pulled away and kissed across her exposed chest until she found the butterfly clasp and closed around it.  When she pulled away Mrs. Hawthorne’s dress fell away from her body!  

Nancy stuck the pin in the side of the basket and continued to dance and move lifting up her right leg so that Mrs. Hawthorne would cup it with her left arm and relieve the growing stimulation from her stroking hand!  The woman obliged sliding her hand up over, back and through and then pulling it up and free as Nancy pirouetted once more letting her long-tapered gam snake up the woman’s body in a relaxing motion coming to rest behind her neck. 

Mrs. Hawthorne pushed forward and lowered herself against Nancy who in turn relaxed her body against the basket sinking the two even further over.  Mrs. Hawthorne stretched out her arms running them up and down Nancy’s torso her tender insistent strokes tensing the prone woman’s body before she reached up and clasp their hands together.  Nancy wiggled and squirmed her body has her lover’s lips nipped the back of her neck.  The snakewoman began to emit a low hiss as she pulled her other leg out of the basket, reached it straight up into the air before carefully lowering it into an upside down ‘L’. 

‘Shall I wrap you in my coils?’ Nancy hissed to the delight of Mrs. Hawthorne. 

‘Yes, but first let me wrap you in mine!’ the woman answered softly as she quickly slid her body about and picked up the inverted D.O.O.M. spy snapping shut her own coils she’d prepared for this deadly snake. 

Nancy was encased in the woman’s body wiggling and writhing with all she had, but to no avail.  The deadly legs and body of Mrs. Hawthorne had her firmly within their grasp as she hissed and slithered her hot body against her opponent as pretence in keeping up the scene. 

The inverted woman knew she had succeeded when she heard Mrs. Hawthorne play along. 

‘Slither all you want in my coils snakewoman they are quite inescapable and rather confining!  Did you really think your little dance and seduction would be so easily?  Now that I have you compromised to my liking we can truly begin your interrogation!’ the woman slyly said as she tightened her grip about Nancy. 

Mrs. Hawthorne twisted the assassinatrix’s body a little more giving her another dose of pain before freeing one of her hands and reaching up into her hair, as she did she heard Nancy’s low sinister voice. 

‘Looking for this Mrs. Hawthorne or perhaps these?’ she said opening both her hand to reveal a lipstick in one and the woman’s ring and earrings in the other!  ‘My tongue has many talents including the removal of unwanted and potentially deadly jewellery!  You didn’t even feel me removing your earrings did you!  As for your ring my hip movements managed to ensnare it in my pussy hair and gently slip it from your finger!  Finally, my toes purloined that very dangerous lipstick from your hair when you allowed me to extract my other leg from my nest!’ Nancy purred with pleasure as she tossed the items away. 

Dazed for second by the serpent’s explanation Mrs. Hawthorne now reacted, but just a split second too late!  She felt a small scratch on the back of her thin ankle and then nothing! 

‘Just a tiny bite but my nail polish is extremely effective and fast acting as you can feel or perhaps I should say can’t feel at the moment Mrs. Hawthorne!’ Nancy’s voice said in a silky tone as she placed her hands on the floor and tumbled over to her feet releasing herself from her former captor’s hold!  Mrs. Hawthorne slumped into a previously strategically placed chaise lounge perfectly suited for the D.O.O.M. agents needs, just as she had planned. 

‘Now that I’ve bitten you with my poison its time for me to secure your lovely body in my coils and massage the poison into you, slowly of course!’ the nude woman smiled as she knelt at the edge of the lounger between her victim’s legs. 

The pale glow of the moonlight illuminated the glistening skins of the two women from their previous encounter as Nancy began to position herself.  Carefully the snakewoman pushed up with her hands on the edge of the lounger pulling her deadly form up and off the floor spun round on her hands depositing her body behind Mrs. Hawthorne’s whom she pulled upright.  Nancy’s smooth slippery legs tantalisingly slithered up and down her opponent’s legs while her willowy arms ran all over and around her victims back and shoulders flushing Mrs. Hawthorne with sensations of pleasure. 

Nancy continued to work her limbs about her foe even as she pressed her flesh against Mrs. Hawthorne’s letting their combined body temperatures and the heat of the night work on her stung victim’s muscles. 

‘Soon I will seize you Mrs. Hawthorne, drawing you into a series of embraces designed to spread my venom throughout your body.  But not yet, I need to make you more pliant so I can bend you into my nest of tangles,’ Nancy hissed as she flicked her wet hot tongue about Mrs. Hawthorne’s ears.  The Assassinatrix drew her legs up slowly the soles of her feet and her toes barely touching her victim as she did.  Mrs. Hawthorne feeling the searing heat of her own perverse lust building in her as the executioner worked her seductive charms. 

Nancy pulled her legs behind the woman and then slid them both in a slow twisting fashion down Mrs. Hawthorne’s right leg the trapped woman swearing she could she blue sparks crackling where their bodies touched! 

‘I’m losing myself in the seduction and giving her just what she wants!’ the drugged woman thought.  ‘Hold on and battle her until you can overcome her deadly charms,’ she willed herself even as her body shivered to Nancy’s touch. 

The D.O.O.M. agent tenderly cupped her two feet around her opposite numbers foot and slowly raised her and Mrs. Hawthorne’s leg off the floor tilting and inclining the woman’s head so she could watch.  What she saw were Nancy’s femme fatale legs displayed to absolute perfect!  From her firm inner thighs to the break in her calves, every sinew and fibre was active beneath the surface of the skin as they danced before Mrs. Hawthorne in a hypnotic fashion. 

‘They are beautiful, aren’t they Mrs. Hawthorne?  I’ve used them to destroy the will of so many in the past!’ Nancy’s satiny voice echoed inside her ear.  ‘And tonight, I can add you to my list!’ 

 Mrs. Hawthorne’s leg was placed at a twenty-degree angle to her body and bent up at the knee at a forty-five degree’s.  Nancy slipped free and repeated the process to her other leg before swinging her body around, lying on her stomach and splaying her legs on either side of Mrs. Hawthorne and in between the hollows she had made of her raised legs while her hands supported her upper body as they pushed off the floor.  Snakelike Nancy’s feet wound into Mrs. Hawthorne’s bush, the flats of her feet tenderly stroking her labia! 

‘I’m glad to see I haven’t lost my touch!  You’re very wet and we’ve hardly begun Mrs. Hawthorne!’ she cooed as her toes massaged slowly inward in feathery touches. 

Mrs. Hawthorne fought the surging tide of arousal Nancy was stroking into her!  She focused her mind and willed her body into resisting the snakewomans touch! 

‘Come Mrs. Hawthorne you cannot hope to defeat me.  We are both experienced older women, we know that delicate and subtle skills cannot be resisted indefinitely especially when applied by skilled women such as us.  You will not be able to stalemate our encounter, only delay it!  My poison is quite long lasting, as am I!  Slowly I’ll wear you down and then you’ll give into me and my embrace!’ Nancy hissed as she worked. 

The Assassinatrix worked tirelessly on the stubborn woman her body running with rivers of sweat as she continued to support herself in her prone attacking position.  Mrs. Hawthorne worked her mind and body to counter the D.O.O.M. woman’s sexy attack keeping her from achieving her goal!  She came to the brink several times only to push back at the last second and survive. 

 Nancy, tired and hot did not let up; she too had her mind focused!  She ignored her own discomfort and concentrated on breaking the will of this woman and closing the trap!  Twice she’d nearly had her and twice she’d managed to escape but not a third-time Nancy knew!  She stroked and pulled softly listening to her captives breathing, adjusting her speed and touch as she worked.  Nancy could feel Mrs. Hawthorne’s heart hammering in her chest as she battled to stay calm!  She could hear her breathing speeding up as gasps of shorter and shorter breaths escaped her mouth!  The Assassinatrix smiled, she was winning this time! '

‘Now to bring our battle of wills to a climax, so to speak Mrs. Hawthorne!’ she purred. 

She adjusted her speed and stroke to perfection as Mrs. Hawthorne countered her mind seizing on and trying to hold her position.  She slipped to the edge over and over again until finally she could hang on no longer and fell over the precipice into a pool of writhing joyous rapture! 

Nancy smiled as her body flaming and sodden from her labours snapped shut around her prey! 

Mrs. Hawthorne’s body, still quivering from orgasm now felt the heat and constriction of the snakewoman about her!  The pleasured woman’s legs were pulled up and behind her head entangled and held there by Nancy’s powerful limbs!  The D.O.O.M. woman then shifted, tucked and rolled their bodies until she had reversed their positions and was now face to face with the helpless woman!  Nancy wrapped her arms into her legs and pulled forward binding the two into a Siamese Sandwich!  The Assassinatrix squirreled their two bodies in delight. 

‘Mmm it was worth the effort!’ she murmured.  ‘You have a wonderful body Mrs. Hawthorne I can hardly wait for tomorrow night!  But why am I getting ahead of myself when both of us can enjoy my coils of delight!’ 

Nancy pulled the two closer every so often letting their torrid body heat steam the pair open!  Despite or perhaps because of the heat Nancy grew stronger while her opponent wilted in her clasp! 

‘You’re a very flexible woman,’ Nancy whispered.  ‘I’m sure our steaming bodies has something to do with it, of course, you seem to be suffering more than I with it.  Not to worry, its all part of the nature of the poison and speaking of poison!’ 

Nancy pulled the woman even closer and pulsated her body about her victim.  Her legs and arms tensing and flexing with subtle snake qualities as she constricted and released.  The sensations built Mrs. Hawthorne again just as Nancy had wanted.  The D.O.O.M. woman closed her tongue around one of Mrs. Hawthorne’s nipples and caresses of silk filled the trapped woman’s body!  Nancy slipped her hands free and cupped them around her opponent’s firm ass feeling her respond in seconds as she tensed her cheeks to the touch! 

‘There is no escape until I released you my dear!’ Nancy said between coddles of the woman’s nipples.  ‘Your will is strong but why fight my skills, they are much too overwhelming and enjoyable!  Twist and writhe within my grip my dear!  You’re only held loosely and see if you can escape!   I assure you though I have you but a delicious try from your magnificent body could be a wonderful attempt!’ 

Again Mrs. Hawthorne submitted to glory her jarring body straining in the grip of the snakewoman.  Nancy worked her nails up the woman’s spine in light touches before so moved to other parts of her trapped scorching body! 

‘Just opening up your poison receptors my dear!’ she as she continued her touch of death.  ‘There that should do it, now all that remains is to hold you still!’ 

Nancy again wove her arms into Mrs. Hawthorne and pulled the two together a final time, only this time it was very tight! 

‘Sorry, but I cannot allow you to move,’ she whispered. 

Nancy’s firm body held them still while the poison flowed into position joining is neighbour from their previous night’s contact.  After several hours, the D.O.O.M. agent unwound herself from her victim stretched her out on the lounger and knelt beside it. 

‘Tomorrow you will remember that we had a wonderful time.  You will tell Catherine all about it and relay the following information,’ Nancy said as she leaned in closer and spoke into Mrs. Hawthorne’s ear.  ‘You will also tell her that you are meeting me tomorrow and the next two nights to extract more information from me.’  Taking Mrs. Hawthorne’s hand, she asked.  ‘If you’ve understood all this squeeze me hand.’  Feeling the compliance Nancy smiled. 

She picked up the discarded lipstick; ring and earrings placed them on the vanity then returned to the prostrate woman. 

‘Till tomorrow night and the centipede Mrs. Hawthorne!’ she hissed and kissed her goodbye.

 

Nancy reached into the basket retrieved a loose-fitting cover up slipped it on and left the hut taking the basket with her. 

Again, she was not alone in the dark as she moved to her hut. 

 

* * * * * * * * * * *

 

‘How long has it been now?’ asked a woman as she took a sip of her champagne. 

‘About ten minutes,’ Inez offered casually. 

‘Will we see her move at all before she dies?’ asked another morbidly curious onlooker, this time a man. 

‘At about the twenty-minute mark Miss Baxter’s body will start to convulse, slowly at first, but soon it will graduate into uncontrollable spasms lasting until the end,’ she added matter of factly.  ‘Right now, I suspect her mind is so overcome with pain that she can barely think!’ 

Shards of searing pain shot across the hemispheres of Claire’s brain.  They exploded in every corner pushing out anything in their way until all her mind could entertain was constant unending searing pain the like of which she had never experienced! 

‘Make it stop! Please end it now! God, make it end soon!’ was all her mind would allow her.  But it didn’t it just kept coming wave after wave of the most brutal torturous hurt Claire had ever experienced, so painful she couldn’t even cry! Through the vale of pain, she was dimly aware of laughter and talking and sometimes the odd thump of a hand on the glass like she was some kind of animal the crowd at a zoo was trying to attract! 

Inez’s guests lapped up the evenings entertainment as more champagne corks popped open and toasts were made to the excellent job the D.O.O.M. agent had done in trapping one of their deadliest nemeses. 

‘Thank you all so much,’ she smiled dangerously raising her glass in salute.  ‘But I think Miss Baxter deserves a great deal of the credit and unless I miss my guess,’ she paused.  ‘Ah yes, she’s starting to lose control, her body’s betraying her and beginning to convulse!’ 

‘No please! Let it end!’ Claire’s mind screamed as her body began to breakdown.  Tears welled in her eyes spilled over and fell from her cheeks crashing onto her shaking body! 

‘You see everyone, not even the legendary strength and suppleness of Miss Baxter can resist my girls Four Petal Orchid! All that’s left is about ten minutes of her life for us to enjoy!  More champagne anyone?’ Inez casually asked. 

The spy frantically tried to control her body!  She willed everything she had and lost the battle before it even started.  Her convulsions grew slowly but ominously, tying her self entangled form even tighter!  Each twitch was agony to endure and seconds dragged on for minutes in her pain-wracked mind! 

‘Twenty-seven minutes by my count,’ Inez said.  ‘I think any second now the show will become much livelier!’ 

Her voice had barely dropped away when the screaming started!  Claire was convulsing horribly within the knot her unrelenting screams giving her audience only the smallest idea of what she was enduring.  Her admirers watched the death sentence play out in desperate high-pitched wails as Claire’s eyelids began to flicker at the speed of hummingbird’s wings.  Her eyes rolled up and back into her head leaving only the ghostly pallor of white to the assembled crowd!  Her body slowly began to shut down, she could feel herself slipping slowly away, but still the pain would not abate as the screaming grew in pitch until it began to bounce off the mirrors in the room and echo back to her as her own funeral march!  She emitted one final enormous scream as her lungs emptied and the world extinguished around her! 

‘I thought you’d be pleased with the information Catherine?’ Mrs. Hawthorne said. 

‘What? Oh yes of course I am!  And from what you tell me we can look forward to even more over the next couple of nights,’ Catherine answered. 

Mrs. Hawthorne gazed over the top of her teacup as she watched Catherine’s brow furrow and unfurl as she wrestled with her thoughts. 

‘What’s happened to Claire!’ Mrs. Hawthorne said in alarm as she put down her cup.  ‘Tell me!’ 

‘Maybe nothing, maybe everything!  I didn’t hear from her last night after the party where she was to obtain the Intel nor this morning and that’s not like her!’  Catherine answered trying to hide the alarm in her voice. 

‘Give me all the details and I’ll go find out what’s happened!’ Mrs. Hawthorne said not hiding the alarm in her voice at all. 

Catherine smiled.  ‘It doesn’t work like that I’m afraid.  Claire is expendable you see.’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne starred back in horror it took all she had not to leap across the table and beat the location out of Catherine!  Instead she clenched her hands so tight to the arms of her chair her fingers turned white but she couldn’t hide the look of disgust on her face or the contempt she found for that remark. 

‘Pardon me,’ she began politely enough before lowering her voice to a growl as she leaned across the table.  ‘Claire is not expendable, not to me at least!’ she added putting the emphasis on the last part of her speech so as to leave no doubt about its meaning. 

Catherine Wycliffe took a sip of tea put down her cup gently on its saucer and met the blazing eyes of the woman. 

‘But she is to C.O.I.L. and she’d be the first to tell you that and that’s where my loyalty has to be and Claire knows that as well!’ 

The Head of Woman’s Operations for C.O.I.L. could see this had made no impression on her companion, as she fully expected it wouldn’t. 

‘Do you sleep better at night after you’ve said that!’ Mrs. Hawthorne snapped back.  ‘It’s a good thing Claire has a friend outside of C.O.I.L. who’s willing to help because her friends within sure don’t care about her!’ she said making to get up. 

‘Sit down!’ Catherine said grabbing her hand and yanking her back into the chair.  ‘You listen to me!  I recruited and helped train Claire, so don’t you tell me about loyalty!  My heart tells me to run out there and save my…Claire!’ she said through clenched teeth.  ‘But I can’t! Because if I do it for her I’d have to do it for them all and that’s not how it works in this game and you know that as do all my female agents!  Once you commit to this life you’re on your own!  That’s part of the allure but its also the bitter reality each one of them has to face!  I want her to be alive as much if not more so than you Mrs. Hawthorne and no one, no one, will be more devastated than me if I have to bury her, but the cold reality is that there will always be another Claire Baxter to take her place!  That’s the nature of the game we play.’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne felt the cold hard words slam into her like a brick wall!  Her chosen career, her means of revenge for what D.O.O.M. had done to her, all seemed so glamorous and made her feel so alive a second ago had vanished.  The only other person in the world she trusted was missing and maybe dead and there was nothing she could do about it!  That hurt enough, but what tore her up was that fact that she knew what Catherine had told her was the ugly truth.  You really were alone! 

‘Besides,’ Catherine added driving her point home.  ‘You’ve got unfinished business here.’ 

They two women ate the remainder of their breakfast in silence neither one tasting or enjoying any of it, their minds both on the same thing but each a million miles and three feet away from the other. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Claire’s ears recorded one long immense explosion of sound and then total silence as blackness enveloped her and she was shot down what seemed to be a long dark tunnel surrounded only by gentle falling white flakes of snow that were everywhere she looked.  She watched them fall fascinated by the fact that as they landed on her they neither felt cold nor melted but merely touched her skin for the briefest of moments and then passed on as they fell away from her.  The spy searched for light, her arms reaching out into the void in some attempt to push away the curtain of blackness that enveloped her.  Her eyes straining, she reached out and clawed the inky midnight until out of the corner of her eye she saw something, she didn’t care what, she just wanted her journey to end and reached out and grabbed it! 

Claire’s body spun round and round within the void as she felt herself sinking ever downward until after what seemed an interminable journey she landed hard on her back and stared up into nothing.  She gave her head a shake and as her ears cleared they began to fill with the sounds of grotesque moans and cries for help from all around her, then she dragged herself, first to her hands and knees and then rolled back on her bent legs.  Her eyes cleared slowly as she rubbed them until a last she was able to focus on the hellish nightmare she’d fallen into! 

Bodies of cut and bleeding people littered the floor, some with large wounds sliced cleanly into them, others with shards and crags of fractured and broken glass driven into and in some cases right through them!  People twitched helplessly on the floor, unable to scream their bodies mimed the horror they were feeling.  She turned her head away, her stomach churning at the carnage to another part of the space where the inhabitants were merely dazed; some covered in the same snowflakes she had experienced earlier in her journey.  Claire squinted and strained her eyes in the poor light knowing somehow that she knew these people, but she wasn’t sure from where until she saw her! 

Inez rolled over, opened her eyes and starred glassy eyed at Claire whose mind cleared in an instant at the sight of the woman!  The spy now took it all in, including her location all the way across the main reception room on the landing near the front entranceway.  The room she had been left to die in had disintegrated all the glass walls and mirrors shattered into perhaps trillions of snowflakes that lay in a white blanket that covered the main room. 

‘Get away! Get away!’ Claire’s brain screamed at her! 

The spy tried desperately to comply reaching out and seizing a piece of furniture.  She half dragged half pulled herself up, but lost her grip and means of support, she was swung round, staggered forward one or two steps and then crashed against the wall and sank to her knees!  She reached up her hands and arms flailing with the smooth wall as she unsuccessfully tried to find a grip.  They collapsed at her side and she rolled over into a sitting position again starring right into Inez’s eyes, which had now cleared.  Something in those dark eyes told Claire all she needed, her heart began to race and she could feel the adrenaline begin the course within her! 

‘Escape now or die!’ her mind fired into her over and over again. 

The C.O.I.L. agent fell over on her hands and knees and painfully slowly made her way to the door and the railing just on the other side.  Along the way, she corralled a sheer large woman’s wrap that had been left at the entrance.  She found the door and slowly, finally the railing, Claire wobbled to her feet, her head swimming, steadied herself and cautiously lowered her body down the steps with an equal mixture of support from her legs and arms, both of which were painfully sore! 

She crashed against a car parked at the bottom step slamming her head on the hood before so wrenched herself over on her back and glazed upwards at the stars! She drunkenly rolled down the side of the car across the front grill before slowly and clumsily wrapping the sheer garment about her body before tumbling in the shadows in a direction that hopefully lead to the street and what she also prayed was safety. 

After an hour, Claire was unsure of where she was anymore or where she was heading she just lurched along until her body could carry her no further!  The spy felt her calf muscles knot in horrible agony, she crashed shoulder first into some unknown wall and fell over tipping several cardboard boxes as she went that spilled their contents on top of her burying her under them.  She pulled her legs up as she curled herself into a ball and tried to rub her legs only to find her arms where quickly becoming as unless as her lower limbs!  Unable to soothe her body she was forced to endure the screaming agony of her knotting muscles.  She lay still, crying and enduring the pain as best she could as her body broke down and betrayed her, the woman’s sobs of agony muffled to the outside world by the garbage she was buried under! 

She came awake sometime during the early morning her body still in horrible agony but the knotting mercifully gone.  She fought to her feet, leaned against the wall, steadied herself mentally as she prepared to move forward every nerve ending, joint and muscle screaming at her as she did.  Claire tried to keep her mind clear and on the single task of making it to the safety of her hotel but she just couldn’t manage the task. 

‘Oh, God I’m hurt really bad.  This may be the end of my career, my life!’ she thought over and over again.  ‘I won’t end my days as a cripple!  I’ll kill myself!’ she allowed her mind to think. 

It took all the force of will she could bring to bear to turn the subject to that of her escape from the Four Petal Orchid but finally she managed it and worked through the trap coming to the only conclusion that made any sense, her escape had been sheer luck! 

‘I must have been screaming at just the right pitch and a high enough volume to shatter the mirrors and the glass in a chain reaction.  That loud boom being the sudden sound explosion that must have forced me free of the knot and shot me across the room to freedom,’ she thought. 

The trick worked for a short time, just short enough to allow her to make it back to the hotel.  Given her state she decided to sneak in a back way and make her way up to her room.  Somehow, she managed that and was able to convince a very skeptical maid the let her in her room.  By now the knotting had returned and she fought back tears as the maid fumbled with her passkey, being more interested in Claire than letting her in the room. 

Finally, the door opened and Claire hobbled in on one leg, her other numb and impossible to stand on.  She closed the door on the maid just as the other leg went numb and she fell!  Crying with pain and moaning she crawled her way over to her bed and pulled her laptop off the night table switched it on and opened her e-mail.  Barely able to see through her tears she laboriously hit the keys and moved the cursor before hitting send.  As her last gesture, she pulled open the drawer of the table, removed her gun and cocked the hammer into place, rolled over, wincing as she did and somehow managed to wedge her body into an upright position against the bed and the table as the gun fell with a thud to the floor before her. 

* * * * * * * * * * *

Nancy moved dangerously amongst the shadows her body slithering and twisting within the undergrowth as she moved towards Mrs. Hawthorne’s cabin. Soundlessly she slipped onto the deck and moved towards a window.   Gingerly she pushed the window open and inserted one of her well-toned legs up and through the opening onto the inside floor.  The other whipped in after it, her whole body tensed aroused and alive at the thought of what was to come.   She danced silently across the teak floor as she scanned the partially moonlit bathed room for her as yet unseen prey. 

‘Did you lose your way my dear Miss Govan?’ 

Nancy turned saw Mrs. Hawthorne stretched out naked on ironically the same lounger the D.O.O.M. agent had used the night before.  The Assassinatrix suppressed a coincidental laugh as her eyes took in the sight before her.   Mrs. Hawthorne’s head was tilted to one side looking at her, the woman’s dark lustrous hair free of its usual styling cascade down her shoulders and unto one of her firm round breasts the strands of which caressed her nipple.  The entire effect so overpowering ethereal given the moonlight that Nancy had to focus hard not to become entranced!  The spy’s gaze slid dangerously downward taking in the woman’s firm flat stomach and thin waist before settling on Mrs. Hawthorne’s slowly dancing hips!  The mesmerising sway held her fixed in place for a few moments and only with a great force of will did she avert her gaze to follow the snake like contour of the woman’s legs from powerful round thighs, to full round firm calves and finally to thin delicate ankles!  Mrs. Hawthorne moved her legs slowly back and forth displaying them for her guest and their power! 

‘An impressive body Mrs. Hawthorne,’ Nancy purred as she fought to control her rising desire. 

‘What’s more impressive is the things I can make happen with it!’ Mrs. Hawthorne’s silky voice replied. 

A younger agent may have succumbed to the woman’s charms and delights but Nancy was too experienced to let that happen!  The suggestion, that she was extracting information from a D.O.O.M. agent that was completely under her spell, she’d put into Mrs. Hawthorne’s head from the previous night was paying off better than she had hoped!   In fact, the reverse was really the reality, but not to Mrs. Hawthorne!  She now thought that she had discovered a D.O.O.M. plot to kill her and that Nancy was the agent that was to carry out the deed.  Only she’d discovered it and had turned the tables by luring Nancy into her trap! 

The Assassinatrix knew it was all twisted but she couldn’t resist the delicious eroticism of it all or the chance to utilise her fighting skills against Mrs. Hawthorne. 

‘Come closer my dear D.O.O.M. agent and I’ll demonstrate my skills for you!’ 

‘Step into your parlour don’t you mean?’ Nancy countered the heat growing in her. 

‘Very well if you insist on making this difficult I just have to leave my parlour and spin a new web!’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne’s hot voice answered as she rose from the lounger and advanced.  Nancy smiled and tensed for the fight as their shadows danced and mingled across the moonlit floor. 

Both women were superbly conditioned and cat quick in their reflexes!  Nancy found Mrs. Hawthorne just as flexible as she was as the woman sank to the ground splaying her legs to avoid a roundhouse kick before pushing up and attempting one of her own narrowly missing!  Nancy felt the whoosh of air against her face from the speed of the woman’s leg! 

Mrs. Hawthorne was a whirlwind of activity her body thrusting and spinning into the action with awesome speed and agility!  She backed Nancy up until she was against the wall and then jutted forward a straight kick at waist level that Nancy dodged at the last second!  The D.O.O.M. spy smashed an elbow into her opponent’s stomach then followed with an upper cut to the jaw!  Mrs. Hawthorne fell back a few steps dazed from the blow!  It was just enough space to allow Nancy to take a run up the wall sideways, rotate herself around in the air and connect with a spinning heel kick to the head of her adversary! 

Mrs. Hawthorne stumbled back further as Nancy cartwheeled forward and snapped a windmill kick to the side of her head spinning the woman around like a top!  Mrs. Hawthorne though smarting from the blows she’d taken was far from beaten!  She flipped back on her hands brining her feet up in front of her cuffing Nancy a double blow with her feet that threw the woman backwards her arms flailing at her sides as she tried to keep her balance!  Incensed at the turn of events Nancy rushed forward into the attack again only to be met with, first a lightning fast strike from Mrs. Hawthorne’s left leg followed by one from the right!  Mrs. Hawthorne flipped forward out of her handstand and delivered a stunning right cross to the jaw of Nancy that sent her lurching backward!  She fell against the edge of a chair and looked up smiling.  

‘I see the spider is just as agile outside of her web as she is alluring in it!’ Nancy offered. 

‘And just as deadly! Come feel my bite!’ Mrs. Hawthorne seductively weaved. 

‘You are not the only insect with a bite my dear woman!’ Nancy countered just as seductively returning to her feet. 

The woman was proving more than a worthy adversary for the Assassinatrix!  Nancy knew Mrs. Hawthorne could defeat her before she was able to spring her trap, she’s implanted the entire scenario hoping for just such an exhilarating encounter!  Giving Mrs. Hawthorne the chance and the freedom to fight just multiplied the eroticism for Nancy! 

The shadows mingled and surged together across the floor as they battled one another until Mrs. Hawthorne’s Deadly Rose fighting style started to score blows to Nancy’s body as her crisp kicks and sharp punches began to wear down the D.O.O.M. woman!  A final kick pushed her back against a wall and pinned her there as Mrs. Hawthorne’s stretched out her leg at a 45-degree angle from her body and held her there while she smiled. 

‘Time to end our little battle Miss Govan and begin the night’s entertainment!’ Mrs. Hawthorne said as she spread the fingers on both her hands and brought them up in front of her face to display them for Nancy. 

‘My Thorn’s Miss Govan,’ Mrs. Hawthorne said clearly referring to her nails.  ‘Will render you mine!’ she continued before both hands struck with incredible speed up and down Nancy’s torso in repeated soft surgical strikes of her nails for several seconds! 

Nancy felt the strikes then a curious tingling feeling just below the skin about her torso before she fell forward into the waiting grip of Mrs. Hawthorne’s body!  The victorious woman added a cinching manoeuvre and Nancy was helpless in her body as she clung to her! 

‘Now to make you rather uncomfortable!’ Mrs. Hawthorne whispered as she cinched herself tightly into position her naked form twisting herself about her prey.  ‘My technique has I’m sure by now worn off and you are free to try and escape me!’ 

Nancy tested her opponent’s request, as her body worked against Mrs. Hawthorne’s, not with power but gentle sways and rubs as the two bodies worked for opposite results.  Carefully Mrs. Hawthorne worked her body about this dangerous woman as Nancy tried to free herself with no success!  The D.O.O.M. spy snaked her body one final time before she knew she’d done all she could. 

The Assassinatrix slowly slithered her entangled form around until she was cheek to cheek with Mrs. Hawthorne.  Nancy ran her tongue around the tip of the woman’s ear before flicking it several times hotly about! 

‘Who has who Mrs. Hawthorne?’ Nancy breathed warningly into the woman’s ear.  ‘I believe I told you I was a biting insect, a very poisonous biting insect in fact!  It’s a pity you and I aren’t on the same side!  I could just imagine the fun we’d have at C.O.I.L.’s expense!’ Nancy said then added.  

‘And with each other!  But lamentably we are not so our encounters must by nature be of an adversarial one, two professionals locked in competition which regrettably can only have one winner, me!’ Nancy purred into Mrs. Hawthorne’s ear before she slid her tongue down the side of the woman’s throat and across the back of her neck alerting a response from Mrs. Hawthorne’s body. 

‘Oh, I’m sorry Mrs. Hawthorne but you’re probably wondering how I managed to reverse your trap and place you at my mercy and soon into my trap!  I’ll give you a hint, you were all around it and it is now all around you,’ Nancy seductively answered as she tenderly kissed up her opponent’s neck before crossing over and continuing down her other cheek. 

‘You see my dear spider I’m not as naked as I would appear to be!  I’m wearing a micro weaved transparent body glove tipped with literally tens of thousands of soft undetectable hollow barbs each one containing a trace amount of centipede poison!  I managed to get a little into you during our wonderful combat but not enough that is until you locked me into your body! And speaking of that it is time for you to feel what I’m capable of Mrs. Hawthorne!’ 

The Assassinatrix folded herself carefully into the woman, her body slithering and slipping into position locking Mrs. Hawthorne into hers with pinpoint precision!  Though not painful Mrs. Hawthorne found it impossible to move!  All she could feel, now that she was attuned to it, were the soft barbs all about her body delivering their poison!  Each brush of Nancy’s body put more into her the barbs feeling like thousands of little legs when Nancy repositioned her! 

‘A very well constructed and well named trap wouldn’t you say Mrs. Hawthorne?  I imagine your incredible body can feel the centipede’s legs running all over it as I move!’ Nancy’s breathy hot voice said. 

The D.O.O.M. spy wrapped her arms and hands carefully about the head and neck of her bitten prey and squeezed gently securing the last element of the trap.  Nancy worked the poison from the barbs into Mrs. Hawthorne, she knew she’d didn’t need to, the amount the woman had already absorbed was more than sufficient to paralyse her, but she was having too much fun!  She moved and body shaped herself to Mrs. Hawthorne every few minutes, her body a tight leech against her rigid foe! 

‘Mmm, you have such a magnificent body my dear woman! Shapely contoured steel cables for legs, a flat toned stomach, lovely moulded round and firm breasts with exquisite pink nipples, a beautiful firm ass and muscular back and one of the most alluring faces I’ve ever seen capped by very kissable lips! Nancy hummed as she worked about the woman. 

‘I think I’ve discharged all the poison I can,’ the Assassinatrix said about an hour later as she slowly began to undo herself from her entwined foe!  She carefully lowered herself and Mrs. Hawthorne to the floor.  Nancy slipped herself free and smiled as she surveyed her triumph! 

‘Now to phase two of our encounter Mrs. Hawthorne!’ she purred as she stood above her victim and carefully inserted her hands down the front of her neck slowly peeling the micro body glove from her form as she pulled it inside out and off her like second skin. 

‘Now let’s see what pampering agents you have that will aid me, ah, this should do wonderfully, scented and expensive.  You do have tastes much like my own Mrs. Hawthorne,’ Nancy said taking the baby powder canister from the nearby vanity and returning to the prostrate woman. 

The D.O.O.M. spy stroked and caressed the powder puff applicator about the woman, the cool drying agent preparing Mrs. Hawthorne for her fate.  Nancy sadistically lingered over the woman’s breasts and pussy applying just a touch of extra pressure as she swirled the puff tensing Mrs. Hawthorne and Nancy with sexual arousal! 

‘Just want to be sure I get you all Mrs. Hawthorne.  Oh, no worry, there’s no extra charge for this!  It’s my pleasure,’ she said sarcastically.  ‘There that should be all of you,’ Nancy continued as she rolled Mrs. Hawthorne off her stomach and onto her back before looking into the woman’s non-responsive glassy eyes. 

‘My goodness, the centipede poison certainly has you deeply in its grip, its time we loosened its hold on you my good woman!  How else can I flow into position and conjoin with you and bring you one step closer to death!’ 

Nancy picked up the body glove and sixty-nined herself on Mrs. Hawthorne’s frozen helpless form!  She slithered and slipped herself about on the woman’s cooled freshly powdered body stimulating them both much to Mrs. Hawthorne’s frustration! 

‘Resist this vixen with all you’ve got!’ she told herself over and over again even as she began to flush with sensations of impending pleasure. 

The D.O.O.M. spy knew she could easily have orgasmed her prey but she had a much more sinister plan to unfold as she slowly began to work the inverted body glove up the woman’s shapely legs!  Nancy slowly pulled her body back off Mrs. Hawthorne as she worked the suit up, stopping just long enough to share her tongue and lips with each of the paralysed woman’s nipples!  The result was a spasm of pleasure that arched the woman’s ass off the floor for the briefest of seconds, but just long enough to allow Nancy to slip the glove over her granite ass!  Mrs. Hawthorne was pushed up like a rag doll into a sitting position and the rest of her body was cocooned in the glove. 

‘My trap is a two pronged one Mrs. Hawthorne,’ Nancy said as she coiled her legs about the woman’s waist.  ‘First the poison barbs immobilise you and then they stimulate you allowing the aforementioned poison to flow into position.  When I apply pressure to your body the barbs dig in slightly and activate routes so the poison can move!  Please try to resist my stimulation for as long as you can it only makes my victory more satisfying when it happens!’ 

The deadly woman closed her arms and legs around Mrs. Hawthorne to a gasp from the woman as the barbs went to work quickly!  Nancy snaked her legs up and behind her prey’s neck and rolled the two over on their sides before the Assassinatrix thrust up to her feet and stretched out the inverted Mrs. Hawthorne whose neck was locked between Nancy’s ankles while her feet were placed at the back of Nancy’s neck and she was pulled stiff! 

The trapped woman was quickly exposed to Nancy’s lethal touch!  A single end of a nail started on the underside of each foot then proceeded down the back of each calf in a side-winding motion as they rose on fell on the contours and sinews of Mrs. Hawthorne’s legs!  Despite her paralysis, the captured woman’s body shivered in response to Nancy’s delicate deadly touch! 

‘I always find a pointed attack the best approach Mrs. Hawthorne,’ Nancy’s voice dripped sweetly as her finger gingerly circled her opponent’s upper thighs before sliding inward to her bush! 

‘Fight the desirous attack!’ Mrs. Hawthorne told herself even as she became wetter! 

Nancy slowed her nails to just as crawl adjusting her pace to match her entangled victims breathing that was becoming much shallower by the minute!  An expert press here and there slowed it further as did the slithering strokes and brushes! Nancy feathered her nails along the outside walls of Mrs. Hawthorne’s labia sending sparks of light across the woman’s brain and seconds later her trapped form spasmed and quaked in Nancy’s hold her low purrs and moans filling the dark silence! 

On queue the Assassinatrix pressed certain parts of herself tight against the woman causing the trapped form of Mrs. Hawthorne to wiggle uncontrollably! 

‘Escape? I think not my hooked little fish!’ Nancy cooed in response to the woman’s shimming body.  ‘I still need to play you a little more! But first I’ll reel you in some!’ 

The D.O.O.M. woman pulled her prey up a little higher in the hold tenderly closing her thighs about Mrs. Hawthorne’s neck.  Helpless to react she felt Nancy’s smooth hands cup her breasts and two fingers caress each of her nipples to erectness in seconds!  The micro barbs bedevilled her at every turn, stimulating her erogenous zones with ceaseless fury and bringing her to orgasm again as Nancy pressed inward once more as the woman moaned in pleasure! 

‘Another one so soon Mrs. Hawthorne.  Frankly, I’m a little disappointed I thought you’d be able to withstand me longer than that!’ Nancy laughed as she worked the woman to a new position and began again.  ‘See if you can at least make me work for this one dear lady!’ 

Nancy was far too lethal and Mrs. Hawthorne too willing to succumb to the body gloves magic!  When she came this time, Nancy pinned herself tight to the woman at every conceivable angle and twisted her prey until she was taut!  Mrs. Hawthorne’s moan reverberated across the floor as she quivered involuntarily in Nancy’s body with joy as the pleasure came again and again and wouldn’t stop!  Her heart leapt up incrementally it beat faster and faster, she began to gasp for breath between moans as her body oozed perspiration and she became slick and damp! 

‘Get control!’ she screamed to herself or this will kill you. 

Her demand for air couldn’t keep pace with her lungs ability to supply it!  Her heart felt like it would tear through her chest on the next beat and still she could not master her desire as the orgasm continued unabated! 

‘I do believe I’ve got your pleasure receptors firmly secured in the micro barbs Mrs. Hawthorne, Nancy hissed with glee.  ‘We must let the poison flow into all the crevices so please try to hang on and endure!’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne’s fit steaming body flexed and writhed in automatic reaction to the glory that shook her but it could not dislodge Nancy or her grip!  Her eyes fluttered and rolled back after several minutes as she lost her last grip on control and passed out!  

She woke up in her bed to a cooling breeze on her face as Nancy’s lips blew welcomed air across her brow. 

‘Do not try to move Mrs. Hawthorne because you can’t anyway the poison still has you for a little while longer at least,’ Nancy said in a whisper.  ‘I could have killed you just then, but then what fun would that be?  I still have two more appointments to keep with you before that finally happens!  Now about tomorrow I want you to avoid Catherine at all costs, tell her whatever lie you think she’ll believe, is that understood,’ Nancy soothed as she stroked the woman’s hair. 

When she had the acknowledgement, she desired the Assassinatrix continued.  ‘Tonight, you extracted extremely valuable information from me and tomorrow night you’ll be getting more.  Even better we’ll be playing the role of lover’s tomorrow that is until you decide to question me let’s say oh ten minutes into our session, understand my dear woman,’ Nancy spoke again Mrs. Hawthorne complied. 

‘Excellent, I can’t wait for tomorrow night, expect me about midnight,’ the D.O.O.M. women closed out the conversation with a heavenly kiss.  Nancy picked up the stripped off body glove and slipped out the door into the blackness. 

‘I heard from her this morning,’ Catherine said in her best cheery voice.  Yes, well as I said I knew all along there was nothing to be concerned about.  No, I’ve sent her along on another mission.  Oh, I’m sorry to hear that but given the circumstances I understand.  No, I’ll see you tomorrow then.  Sorry I can’t make breakfast.  How about noon for lunch? Excellent!  Oh, and do be careful!’ she added almost as an afterthought before absentmindedly hanging up the phone from Mrs. Hawthorne. 

‘Well that’s at least one less headache to worry about!’ she thought. ‘Even if I had to lie to achieve it.’ 

The truth Catherine Wycliffe knew was not so cheery and concealing it from Mrs. Hawthorne did not sit well with her, which in and of itself was strange.  She after all had been the one to order Claire not to meet with Mrs. Hawthorne as the ‘C.O.I.L. Jury’ was still out on whose side she really was on.  

The early evidence as she’d reminded Claire. ‘Did not point favourably to Mrs. Hawthorne being a reliable ally.  Rather a woman who would manipulate and deceive anyone to get her way, including C.O.I.L. operatives, of which there’d been more than a few run ins with!’ 

Claire had of course defied her and even managed to persuade her to meet what Claire described as a most remarkable woman.  She had agreed reluctantly and now had to agree that Mrs. Hawthorne was rather remarkable and could at times be a useful ally to C.O.I.L.  Truth was Catherine had no idea where Claire was, even if she was alive, but that shouldn’t have surprised her given their current relationship. 

Claire had become more defiant more opinionated on how things needed to be run.  On more than one occasion she openly questioned Catherine’s methods and motives in front of other agents, even to the point of accusing her of trying to kill them with her tactics!  After the outburst, Catherine, had banished Claire from C.O.I.L. HQ. and now only communicated with her via e-mail and the phone and that was only to issue orders to her! Catherine again checked her e-mail to see if she had any replies to her queries. ‘You have no new messages,’ she read dolefully. 

With nothing else to do and no companion for the day Catherine turned her attention to her body.  She slipped off her caftan and began to stretch her unwilling form.  She knew she’d been neglecting it for much too long and now she was feeling it, but the daily strain and demands of running C.O.I.L.’s Women’s Section did not leave much spare time to attend to such matters.  Slowly, between a good workout and an even better book her day seemed to slip away and soon it was dark.  Her last thought as she turned in for the night was that whether or not Claire was found or decided to report in, tomorrow was their last day here. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Delicious scents complimented the small candles Mrs. Hawthorne had strategically placed about her main room.  Their flames flickered and danced creating a myriad of ever shifting and playful shadows across her floor and walls.  Shadows she knew would become much more playful once she had Miss Govan in her clutches and to ensure such an outcome she’d adorned herself in a single sheer wrap of mosquito netting! 

‘One slight tug and I’ll be free of the garment but Miss Govan will find me more than clingy enough and my bite is much more pleasurable than any mosquito!’ she thought to herself as she put the finishing touches in place then checked herself on the mirror one final time.  A small feminine tapping on her door brought a smile to Mrs. Hawthorne’s lips as she moved gracefully to the door. 

Chantal Govan had prepared for the evening as well Mrs. Hawthorne observed.  She was wearing a loose-fitting coral dress with the side panels cut away so the front came inward like a diamond revealing her sides and hips and all the firm touchable flesh she possessed!  Two long slits allowed Nancy’s legs the freedom to escape the dress and the means to distract!  She smiled and moved past Mrs. Hawthorne her tight lovely ass wiggling as she went.  Mrs. Hawthorne scanned up from there to the open plunging back that showed a sexy toned swagger as Nancy moved away entrancing her hostess as she did and intended to do! 

‘I see you’ve thought of everything,’ Nancy smiled as she turned around.  ‘Candlelight, wine,’ she added picking up a glass. ‘And you!’ said the Assassinatrix her lips pursing at the end as she blew a kiss Mrs. Hawthorne’s way before reclining elegantly on the arm of the sofa crossing her legs as she went. 

Mrs. Hawthorne walked over, picked up a glass, took a sip, crossed dangerously close in front of Nancy letting just a wisp of her sheer material brush the woman’s leg before sitting down next to and slightly below her on the sofa.  Nancy’s body gave a slight involuntary shiver at her touch a fact that the other woman did not miss! 

As she went to cross her own legs Mrs. Hawthorne slipped her feet out of her sandals.  Her leg came up and over her own catching Nancy’s crossed leg on the way down before settling with her ankle gentle stroking up and down against her guests.  A few minutes of silent stroking later Mrs. Hawthorne expertly pushed Nancy’s shoe off her foot to the floor below.  She swung her leg outward, contacted her lovers other leg and repeated the process. 

The delicate sensual mature touch of Mrs. Hawthorne was wonderful and Nancy could feel her clitoris beginning to pulse with anticipation as she leaned closer to her.  Mrs. Hawthorne cupped the palm of her hand around Nancy’s heal gently rubbing it until she began to snake it up and down the woman’s calf each repetition taking her a little higher up her leg and tensing her partner!  Nancy could feel the heat rising within her as she grew with desire and wetness for the woman!  She turned slightly, uncrossed her legs to allow her lover’s hand a smoother path to her pussy, which Mrs. Hawthorne did, as she danced her fingers around Nancy’s flexing smooth thighs their cool skin contrasted perfectly with the heat radiating from her mound! 

The hand hot and a little damp slipped itself around Nancy’s back until it found the button and undid it freeing the material from its hot wearer but slithering back about her bush.  Nancy bent forward brining her head across the back of the neck of Mrs. Hawthorne, the woman taking the queue, reaching up with her free hand and undoing the clasp!  As the massage continued the dress was tenderly slipped free and discarded without Mrs. Hawthorne breaking her rhythmic strokes! 

‘God your wonderful Mrs. Hawthorne!’ Nancy thought as her head nuzzled against the neck and shoulders of the woman her moist lips kissing Mrs. Hawthorne when she could focus for long enough to remember. 

The D.O.O.M. spy undid the sheer garment with the merest touch of her fingers.  It slipped down and off Mrs. Hawthorne’s breasts the last remnant of the fabric teasingly hanging on one of her swelled nipples!  A delicate shift freed her body from it as she swung in position her lips wetting Nancy’s thighs as she pushed them upward into her bush!  Mrs. Hawthorne removed her one hand and caressed it around Nancy’s dancing tight ass as the woman swayed in pleasure.   The D.O.O.M. woman returned the favour running her hands and forearms down the back of Mrs. Hawthorne and over the curve of her ass gently cupping and squeezing her cheeks as she turned in about! 

Mrs. Hawthorne pulled Nancy off the arm of the sofa as she sunk to her knees!  The Assassinatrix reluctantly released her grip on her lover’s cheeks with a final squeeze and pulled them up the woman’s back, her nails scratching slightly as she did squirreling her lover with tingles of sexual arousal!  She trailed them into place at the base of her lover’s neck and gently massaged, her rhythm matching that of her partner’s ambitious tongue. 

Mrs. Hawthorne’s probing tongue flicked over Nancy’s outer labia jerking the woman as Mrs. Hawthorne’s hands seized and held Nancy’s wonderfully ass!  The D.O.O.M. woman’s hands began to run through her lover’s hair, Nancy feeling the sheen and silky softness of it as she went.  Her lover’s hot tongue melted into her with soft flowing warmth as Nancy moaned in joy and spasmed sharply at the touch of it. 

Nancy pressed Mrs. Hawthorne’s head tenderly into her bounty as she swayed!  The tip of the woman’s tongue teased torturously about her clitoris, promising but never delivering for endless minutes on end until Mrs. Hawthorne captured it in place, rolling and swelling over it!  Nancy stiffened and gasped her breath fighting to get in and escaping in shorter and shorter pants as she rose up on her toes and shimming her entire body.  She felt the release come like a runaway train rocketing through her at the last possible second, she pushed Mrs. Hawthorne’s head down and into her thighs closed around it and rolled forward in a somersault! 

Two complete revolutions later Nancy still spasming with joy and moaning from a fantastic orgasm held the trapped and frantically wiggling Mrs. Hawthorne in a very tight ball she had wrapped about her. 

‘You nearly had me Mrs. Hawthorne!  Your tongue is quite a deadly weapon. But in the end, it’s I that have you!’ Nancy said breathlessly as she squeezed the two together matching her constrictions to the wonderful aftershocks of the orgasm! 

Mrs. Hawthorne worked her body tirelessly as she flexed herself slowly loose!  Her straining muscles and contortions countered by Nancy’s pressure. 

‘Your strength is impressive my lover,’ Nancy mocked.  ‘You may yet escape me!’ 

The two naked heaving bodies writhed and tweezed about each other for many hours until Mrs. Hawthorne had worked herself into striking position!  Her lips and tongue pushed once more inside Nancy while her arms wedged open her legs!  Nancy flailed to escape the kiss of the woman until her tongue stung her clitoris with its poisonous touch and she was paralysed by it.  Quick thrusting strikes stilled Nancy allowing Mrs. Hawthorne to ply her skills!  The Assassinatrix resisted marvellously for a long time, but the woman was determined as she worked, not quickly but slowly her experience her asset! 

Nancy willed herself to hang on but Mrs. Hawthorne’s fiery probe defeated her minutes later as she came and came as Mrs. Hawthorne’s danced her continuously to joy her body lost to her mind as she screamed in ecstasy!  One gigantic spasm and Mrs. Hawthorne slipped free of Nancy but not the poison! 

‘A bit of a twist tonight Mrs. Hawthorne, not that I’m complaining!’ Nancy said rising to a siting position her chest heaving, her body damp.  ‘It would appear I held you just long enough for the very slow acting poison I coated myself in tonight to take effect.  You won’t remember last night but I did tell you tonight would be The Toad! However, I don’t think I told you I would be a Poison Toad, just like the real thing!’ Nancy hissed gloriously. 

‘I’m glad you struggled as much as you did to escape me even falling for my trap of letting you position me for escape via another orgasm!  I thought that added touch was sheer genius on my part!  And now the toad poison has you held tightly just as I did!’ Nancy cooed as she watched Mrs. Hawthorne lurch toward her for a final time before collapsing inches from her!  ‘Now its my turn to use my skills after all turnabout is fair play, she laughed as the Assassinatrix slithered over to her so that she could crawl down her body. 

‘You-are-the-sexiest-deadliest-orgasmically-delightfulest-woman-I’ve-ever-had-the-pleasure-of-killing-Mrs. -Hawthorne! I-almost-wish-it-wasn’t-so! Almost!’ Nancy said between soft moist wet tender kisses to her victim.  Nancy slipped down her body and began her caress of Mrs. Hawthorne’s nipples. Her fingers and mouth took turns switching from each nipple until she pushed the woman over the edge!  An intense flowing warm climax filled the woman and Nancy massaged her torso meticulously her hot hands and the sweat from the two providing a slippery lubricated surface for her to slide about! 

‘I hope you appreciate the effort it takes to work the poison into in lovely body my dear!’ Nancy derisively laughed as she rubbed. 

Nancy slipped herself farther down the woman and began nuzzling and kissing her wet pussy!  ‘Any last words Mrs. Hawthorne before I sink my sweet but venomous lips into your succulent wetness!’ 

The Assassinatrix pulled up the woman’s legs and tenderly began running her hands up and down them in an increasingly complex pattern.  Their lips meet, each moist with desire!  Nancy opened and closed her lips slightly about the woman’s labia her soothing wonderful touch belying her true intent!  The soft feathery touch of her lips coupled with the moist hot air she blew over her bush from time to time weakened the woman’s resolve.  A few sucking kisses and a light roll of the tongue, just a butterfly’s touch broke Mrs. Hawthorne’s will! 

Nancy felt the rush but kept her touch light and airy just as before!  She tightened about the woman holding her loosely in a body vice as she came!  The orgasm complete Nancy rolled the two over reversing their positions as she slipped her hands in place about her partner’s spine, her nails working into place to a sharp jerk from her prey! 

‘A double paralysis to ensure your complete co-operation my dear!  My nails temporarily block your nerve endings for this critical phase! I need you completely still so the orgasm can sweep the last of the poison into place.’ 

Mrs. Hawthorne felt the tongue slip inside and course around the walls of her inner labia for endless minutes!  One final circumnavigation and Nancy pushed inward found her swollen clitoris and wrapped her lethal probe about it in perfect stillness! 

‘Oh, my God!  She’s using a variation Tantric sex to finish me!’ Mrs. Hawthorne realised.  ‘I could be here for hours a prisoner to this woman!’ 

Nancy slowed her breathing and slipped into a mantra as she waited for Mrs. Hawthorne to slowly build to orgasm.  Mrs. Hawthorne could do nothing but wait and hope she could somehow elude centuries of teaching and escape!  The two women hotted up quickly in the thick night air and soon rivers and sweat rolled off of them and they glowed from their combined temperatures!  Still Nancy did not move and barely breathed, her tongue still coiled in position she waited patiently for her victim. 

Many hours later Nancy came out of her trance when she felt a small drop of sticky liquid drip onto her probe!  A minute later the drop turned into a torrent as Mrs. Hawthorne spilled endlessly!  Nancy’s tongue secured itself in place as the flood came on and on to her delight!  Small wisps of air escape the trapped woman; her only means of expression as the delight worked her body to the edge! 

Nancy coiled her tongue a little tighter sending a second wave into the delirious woman.  The torrent continued but the Assassinatrix held her sending a third and finally a fourth shock wave into the woman!  The D.O.O.M. spy waited then uncoiled her tongue and Mrs. Hawthorne from her body. 

 The spent woman flopped off her chest heaving, her body spent from the attack! 

‘Was that good for you?’ Nancy laughed before picking up her beleaguered foe and carrying her to the bed. 

‘You know after tomorrow night I’m going to miss all this!  To tell you the truth I could kill you every night my dear oh so erotic woman!  Not a painful death, but a slow sweet loving one within my body!  Which, speaking of that, I promise to give you tomorrow night!  Now as always, we need to review our story, otherwise, people may begin to suspect!’ she said. 

Once she was satisfied Nancy gave the woman a passionate goodnight kiss before donning her dress and slipping into the night. 

‘I’m going to miss those lips terribly after tomorrow night!’ she said into the dark. 

* * * * * * *

He closed the door with just the slightest of metallic noise as the bolt caught.  Despite that he still heard it from behind his desk on the other side of the room and he knew it meant some sort of bad news. 

‘We have a problem with Nancy,’ he said taking a seat across the desk. 

‘I was never fond of 20 questions,’ he said in a cold voice not bothering to look up from his work.

 

His subordinate squirmed a little in his seat both at the rebuke and the information he now had to relay. 

‘It seems communication got its timing wrong and sent the go ahead for Nancy’s termination a day to soon.  It, ah, seems they miscalculated the time difference,’ he cringed as they final word left his mouth. 

‘And all this means precisely what?’ he said finally looking up from his work. 

‘Nancy won’t be able to complete the final phase of her operation on that woman, Mrs. Hawthorne!’ he answered. 

‘Well that doesn’t seem like too much of a disaster to me!’ he smiled then smiled some more seeing firstly the puzzled then relieved look on the others face. 

‘Claire Baxter, C.O.I.L.’s number one agent is missing and from what Inez tells me will be dead in days from her encounter.  Mrs. Hawthorne is at best a minor irritant that we can take care of in the future!  All in all, I’d have to say it was a pretty successful operation!’ and Nancy Prud’homme, a woman who should have been killed long ago for her unfaithfulness to D.O.O.M. will soon be dead as well he chimed. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

Nancy awoke slowly to the pleasure between her legs!  She stretched her hands about her head and twisted her hips as she opened the space a little more.  ‘Delicious,’ she purred carefully reaching down and pulling away the silk sheet.  She arched her hips up off the bed and danced them slowly as she pushed back on her neck, gasping and moaning!  The Assassinatrix shifted herself to the edge of the bed coming to a standing position with her embracing lover. 

‘Where did you come from?’ she asked rhetorically as her lover hugged her closer. 

Nancy guided her lover where she wanted him to go and willingly he went only too happy to please. 

The spy caressed and stroked her lover, her hips undulating in and out in small sways until their positions meshed and their rhythms synched!  The woman was in no hurry to pleasure her lover; several times she stopped their dance so each could adjust their positions before beginning again.  

The two moved slowly about her large bedroom until Nancy could feel her body tensing.  She moaned in a low breathy tone as she squirreled and worked her lover’s body against hers.  Her joy lasted a long time; she closed her eyes and wrung every bit of it out, her hips thrusting purposefully against her lover!  She came to her senses just in time as her lover tried to slip another coil about her! 

 

‘No, I’m afraid that won’t do my lover!’ Nancy said to the Albino Python coiled about her. 

The snake was coiled up one leg, once around her hips and against her pussy then across her breasts.  Its head and most of its body she had teased into place out one arm and down to the floor.  The spy purposefully swayed and gyrated her body as she calmed her lover carefully managing her position in its embrace! 

The snake instinctively began to tighten what it had about her with inward undulations of its sinuous mass! Nancy felt its grip about her naked hot form but she let it have its way for the moment as she moved her lethal form to an even more sensuous dance.  Her muscles pulsed and resisted the coils as she moved slowly about the floor until she came to the three-sided dressing mirror.  She moved in close and with the aid of the moonlight inspected her situation.  The python had her secured and now it was slowly crushing inward waiting for her to weaken and then it in one fluid motion would throw its looping death around her in endless bands of self-tightening knots!  The sight of the serpent wrapped about her beguiled Nancy for several seconds before she thrust her hips forward with a quick snap and turned her torso like a winding spring! 

 She smiled as she let go of the trailing body with her hands and unwound her leg!  She slipped her hips from the reptile as it fell to the ground at her feet. 

‘Sorry lover but my coils are deadly too, much too deadly!’ she hissed. 

‘Miss Nancy, you kill snake with body!’ one of the cabin girls said as her silhouette appeared in the mirror. 

 The D.O.O.M. woman turned around and smiled at her. 

‘Yes, please dispose of it,’ she said. 

‘Yes Miss. Right after sister and I dispose of you!’ the girl said as her sister stepped out of the shadows to join her. 

‘D.O.O.M. or C.O.I.L.?’ Nancy asked in an unconcerned voice. 

 ‘D.O.O.M. Miss Nancy,’ they said together as the two pulled off their loose dresses and moved closer. 

 ‘I just love a ménage a trois!’ Nancy smiled. 

* * * * * * * * * * * *

‘I see your shadow is no longer with you. You two were attached at the hip and other places from what you told me,’ Catherine smiled at her as they waited at the airport the next day.

‘Yes, she seems to have disappeared overnight, not surprised really.  Perhaps I played my hand a little too well and she suspected her trap was not really working.  Pity she was a delightful woman but I suspect I’ve seen the last of her, D.O.O.M. does not take kindly to failure, especially twice.’

‘I’ll let you know about Claire one way or the other Mrs. Hawthorne I promise!’  ‘I take it your off in search of D.O.O.M. once more?’ 

‘Always,’ she answered. ‘And you?’ 

‘Back to C.O.I.L. but for how much longer I don’t know?’ Catherine said as she turned and walked away, not bothering to explain the multiple meanings her last sentence contained.