To an outside observer the scene would seem strange to say the least. Bizarre would be a more fitting word, or perhaps even absurd. Six Asian gentlemen in uniform – all short, four of them bald and five of them rotund to one degree or another – standing more or less in a line staring ahead. In front of them, not more than six feet away, stands a red haired woman whose graceful figure contrasts amusingly with the gnome-like figures of the men. The observer would notice that she is quite tall (5'11" exactly). But that is not the first thing she would notice. The first thing she would notice would be that the red-head is naked. But before she can assess the woman's long legs and muscular abdomen, her firm breasts and supple torso, her attention would be drawn to the dark wooden beam bound across the prisoner's athletic shoulders and then to the short chain that runs between her shackled ankles.

For she is undoubtedly a prisoner. Why else would this redheaded beauty be bound naked in front of six North Korean officers? There is a seventh Asian man in the room. He holds a riding crop in his right hand and stands next to his prisoner. He is taller than the others but not as tall as his prisoner. He is wearing a well tailored suit. The beam is about seven feet long, long enough to accommodate the span of the naked prisoner's arms, which like her legs are long and ripple with well toned muscle. The beam rests on top of her bare shoulders; her arms are stretched out beneath it. Her fully extended wrists come to a few inches of the end of the beam where they have been lashed to the wood by wide web straps, further proof she is indeed a prisoner. There is also a second set of straps at her elbows and a third just below the hollow of her armpits, binding her arms tightly to the beam. To an observer who could see her only from the waist up it would appear as though she were crucified, an impression that is heightened by the suffering that suffuses the poor girl's features. But our observer can see the full height of the prisoner's naked body and knows she is not hanging from the crosspiece but is supporting it.

And the lumber is heavy. Even for one as obviously strong as the young captive – it is hard to say for sure but she appears to be in her mid to late twenties – the weight must be a torment. Even though she has managed to keep her back erect her legs are trembling with the strain. And the sweat…it seems to ooze from every pore of her body, rolling from under her arms and down her sides, between her breasts and over her belly, glistening on her thighs and pooling around her bare feet. But wait; if the burden is so heavy that it is slowly crushing her – both body and spirit – why is she halfway up on her toes, her calves bunched and straining? It is not only her legs that are shaking now, her entire body is trembling. So slowly she eases her heels down until they touch the floor, and as they do, her mouth is twisted into a grimace of pain and she moans so quietly that she is the only one that can hear it.

Only now does our observer see the wire. From her distance it is almost invisible, but now it is clear. It is clear why the naked girl was on her toes. It is clear why there is a post three feet in front of her and another three feet behind. It is clear why she grimaced in pain.

The posts are made of the same wood as the crosspiece that binds the captive's arms so cruelly. They are the height of her naval. A length of piano wire runs from one to the other between her thighs. The wire is not taut but from the angle at which it disappears under her pubic bush and reappears behind her buttocks the observer can be pretty sure that it is not only between the lips of her vagina but is deep enough to be cutting into her most tender flesh. Our observer winces, almost feeling the horrid thin metal at the apex of her labia, at her clitoris, at her perineum. Worse, she sees the spool that holds the wire at the top of the forward post and the small wheel and ratchet that can be used to take up the slack, tightening the wire, stiffening the wire, lifting the wire until it is impossible for the naked prisoner to rise any higher on her toes and the wire slices deeper and deeper into her sex.

The observer almost cries out in sympathetic pain, must catch herself to remain silent. She realizes she has not heard a sound. Not a word from the Korean officers, not a cry of pain from their helpless victim. She is too far away from them to hear their breathing, even the labored panting of the tortured girl as she once again rises an inch on her toes. It is silent as a tomb.

The observer has questions and even in the silence there are some answers. Who is this woman with the body of an athlete and the face of a model? An agent, a spy of some kind. Why has she been stripped naked and bound to the heavy wooden beam in front of these men who watch her so closely? She is being interrogated. How did she get here? How was she captured? For that the observer will have to construct a scenario using her certain knowledge, vague recollections and pure imagination.

It wasn't a thought really, not the kind of mental occurrence that comes to you in words. It was more of a flash of realization that permeates ones consciousness. If there had been words – if indeed there had been time for words – her brain would have said "Oh shit! How could I have been so stupid." But there was no time for thought between seeing the figure at the farthest reaches of her peripheral vision and the bite of the stun gun through her top.

Megan was still flopping around on the floor when they rolled her onto her stomach and fastened her wrists behind her with nylon cuffs and then bound her ankles. Two of them seized her under her armpits while the third called for instructions. "Downstairs. A car will be there," he said in Korean. She understood and began to struggle. One of them said something she didn't quite hear and the other two laughed. Still she twisted and writhed the entire distance as they dragged her down the hall, into the elevator and descended to the garage where the large black sedan was just pulling up as the elevator door slid open. A man in a suit came out of the back of the car and as he did the lithe prisoner arched her back, drew her legs up to her chest and kicked out, all in one smooth yet violent motion, just catching him in the shoulder. Just as quickly the head guard brought his fist into her stomach with full force and then again lower, in her belly. A canvas tarp was thrown over her head and wrapped tightly around her before she was thrown gasping for air onto the floor behind the front seat. Less than twenty minutes after being hit by the 50,000 volts she was sitting in a metal chair, still bound hand and foot and totally aware that the best thing that could happen to her would be a quick death, a luxury she was sure the gentleman sitting behind the desk would not allow.

"Where is your partner?" he said.

"I work alone."

One of the guards who had been standing at the side of the chair and slightly behind took one step forward and crashed his fist into her solar plexus. She doubled up and started to slide off the chair but was grabbed by the hair and pulled back into the seat. He backhanded her across the face so hard she heard the vertebrae in her neck snap and for a fraction of a second actually blacked out. Another guard grabbed her shoulders from behind and held her upright. Then man behind the desk waited a minute until she had recovered enough to listen to him.

"Don't lie to me. Ever. It makes me mad. I do not expect you to volunteer information," and here he grinned broadly, "At least not at first. But do not lie to me. Stay silent or just shake your head, but don't lie, not even to say ‘I don't know.' Now, where is your partner?"

"I don't have one."

He laughed. It was a short loud bark. Then he shook his head. "You are a very brave young woman. Too brave, in fact. What is your name?"

"Eleanor Roosevelt."

He sighed. "You might be brave but you are not funny. In fact that last attempt at a joke tells me you are not as brave as I thought you were. Or as you might think you are for that matter, although I think you are very, very scared. Hmmm?"

This time she said nothing, staring back at him, thinking he didn't look totally Asian, must have a western parent or grandparent or maybe it was his English which was perfect and without accent that made her think so.

"Well," he said reaching for the phone, "You know what comes next. Good luck." He punched three numbers into the dial, smiling at her while he did. "You see, I also have a sense of humor." Then into the phone in Korean, "I am sending her downstairs," and hung up.

The guards had already lifted her off the chair, one on each side, tightly gripping her biceps. He rose and walked around the desk to stand in front of her. "Strip her and strap her to the…" Here he used a word she did not know. "We will use…to start. Prepare her." Again he used a word she did not know and it scared her. He was looking at her intently now, staring into her eyes that were just inches away. He forced his hand between her thighs and cupped her crotch. She stared back, hard, sure she was not showing her fear. She would have butted him with her forehead but a guard had grabbed her tightly by the hair the moment he stepped near. Instead she spit in his face. "Very nice," he said, "Let's see how long you hold out under my torture."

She heard the scrape of his desk chair as they dragged her out the door.

As much as fear she felt the humiliation. She spoke five languages, had a Masters in comparative lit, had been a collegiate gymnast despite her height and could run the four hundred meters just shy of world class time. And now she was at the mercy of three thugs whose combined IQ was probably twelve. Yet she had failed and they had won. It was one of them who stood with a knife at her throat. And it was she who was helpless before him with her wrists cuffed so tightly behind her that her hands were numb and her ankles bound so closely she could not have stood without being held. It was almost unbearable to see the big one with the knife smirk before he began to cut away her top.

Stripped to the waist she stared into his gaze, showing nothing of the fear and humiliation that churned in her belly, but only the hatred that she now needed to use as a weapon for self preservation. Even when he dropped his eyes to her bared breasts she stared into his face, her face a mask even as he cupped his left hand under her right breast and tested its weight. Then he rolled her nipple between thumb and middle finger until he felt it harden. He pulled her breast out and slightly up as he pressed his knife into her at the point where the pebbly cinnamon colored skin of her aureole met the silky smoothness of her alabaster skin. He pushed with enough pressure for her to feel the needle sharp point and its frightening potential but he did not draw a drop of blood. When he was sure she understood that the knife was razor sharp and he was an expert in its many uses on a restrained female body – that he could have as easily peeled her nipple away from her breast as skinned an apple – he withdrew the knife.

Looking once more into her implacable face he said to his two partners, "Arrogant bitch. I can't wait to make her scream like a baby."

"I think Chang might want to work on this one personally," the guard holding her right arm replied.

He said nothing in return and turned and walked away. She followed him with her eyes, her peripheral vision taking in the room, or the part that was lit. It was large, at least the size of a basketball court, perhaps much larger. Only the area in which she was being held was illuminated and the light became crepuscular as it spread, barely reaching the base of the wall to which her chief tormentor was walking. The floor was concrete and the walls appeared to be also. Dull gray concrete.

He walked back toward her with the wooden beam, holding it by the two innermost straps and carrying it with some effort. Dark, heavy, foreboding: she didn't know what its exact purpose was, only that it was a safe bet it was going to be used in her torture. The sight sent a chill of fear racing through her and she shuddered. She caught the two guards holding her glance at each other and smile; one even gave a short snort, indicating how superior he felt to his captive. She cursed herself silently for her weakness and looked back at the massive wooden beam.

For no logical reason she was quite sure it was going between her legs, that she would somehow be forced to ride it while her torturers worked on her. But those thoughts lasted only an instant - the straps, its length -even that she had not been totally stripped but only denuded from the waist up told her how her arms would be stretched out and bound to the dark timber. It would hold her frozen in place so when she was writhing in pain it wouldn't interfere with the precise application of the instruments of her torture. What it would be fitted to and what other restraints would be used she did not know and didn't want to guess.

Why, she thought, did this piece of wood frighten her so? Yes, it was her first sight of a device that would actually be used in her interrogation, but from the moment of her capture she knew she would be tortured, tortured without mercy, perhaps slowly tortured to death. This was simply an implement of that sentence, and not a particularly malevolent one at that. Not like a soldering iron or flaying knife. Still, when the beam was laid at her feet and the two guards unfastened her wrists she began to struggle. Once she was strapped to the crossbeam it would all be over, just a matter of time before her torment began. So she struggled, valiantly but ineffectually, unable to prevent her bound feet from being swept from beneath her and her body from being positioned face up on the floor with her shoulders against the beam.

The two guards knelt by her prone body, holding her by the wrists. She gasped in pain when together they pulled out and leaned their weight back full on their heels so her arms were painfully stretched to their maximum. The big one positioned her head at the center of the beam and then fastened the straps under her armpits first, then the ones around her elbows. She arched her back and tried to whip her bound legs around, but with the beam now securely strapped across her shoulders her struggles were nothing more than a pitiful charade of defiance. When her wrists had been bound the three men stood and stared down at their half naked prisoner. She stopped struggling and lay motionless, her head resting on the edge of the thick beam. It was utterly useless to resist these men; all it did was show them her fear and lack of control. She was embarrassed and disappointed at herself once again and stared up at the ceiling, determined not to fight the inevitable. When they opened her belt and began to pull her tight fitting pants over her hips she closed her eyes. The material clung to her sweating thighs and one of them had to lift her off the floor by the waist so they could get them down to her knees. Still she did not struggle, even when she felt the fingers under her briefs and the nails scratching her mons through her light dusting of pubic hair as her captors finished denuding her.

One of them held her legs by the shins while another freed her ankles but she did not fight them. They removed the rubber soled shoes and pulled the last remnants of her clothing over her feet. She pushed all thought of resistance out of her mind and concentrated on her training. She had to be ready. It won't be long, she thought, before they start to work on me. I have to be ready. I have to be strong.

She felt them fitting the shackles, heard the ratchets click, click, click until the steel was snug around her ankles. She opened her eyes. With her arms stretched and bound beneath the thick crossbeam, her head was pressed forward and she looked down the length of her naked body. She glistened with sweat, a moist patina that coated every inch of her bared flesh. Her breasts rose and fell rapidly and she realized she was panting like a runner about to break the tape. She tried to control her breathing and managed to slow it but still her breasts heaved on her straining ribcage betraying her fear. Her nipples rode stiff and hard on her rising and falling breasts. She thought how sensitive her nipples were, how the lightest touch of a lovers tongue would send electric pulses of delight through her nerves. Now they were standing straight up, waiting for the clamps to be tightened around them so a different sort of electricity could course through them, bringing not delight but mind-numbing agony.

She managed to tear her eyes from her nipples and her mind from the torture. Below her breasts lay her tight hard stomach and below that drops of dewy sweat sparkled in the red-blonde copse of her thighs. The space between her bare feet – delicate feet, small for her size and looking even smaller to her in their thick steel shackles – was spanned by a six inch long chain. And she was glad for it, glad her ankles were closely fettered, because as long as they were her legs couldn't be spread.

She recognized the absurdity of the idea the moment it passed through her mind. As easily as they had shackled her ankles they could remove them and pull her legs as far apart as they wished. But they weren't going to rape her, at least not yet. They were going to torture her, and the thought of them spreading her thighs wide and torturing her there was almost more than she could bear. What would they use? A barbed whip? Hot needles? Sulphuric acid? She looked down at her naked chained body and wanted to weep.

With some effort the two guards pulled Megan to her feet using the ends of the beam to lift her. She staggered for a moment, and with her feet tethered by the short chain it was only her gymnast's sense of balance that kept her from falling. She quickly adjusted to the clumsy weight and awkward way it was bound across her shoulders and stood, her back straight, breathing heavily from the effort.

A noose at the end of a short rope was dropped over her head and pulled tight around her neck. The big guard grunted at her and tugged on it once before starting to walk toward the center of the chamber. She had no choice but to follow, moving in a rapid shuffle to keep up, not wanting to pitch forward on her face with the heavy wooden beam on top of her; and in the minute's time that it took to walk the thirty feet, Megan experienced something she had never before felt – utter humiliation. Humiliated at being forced to stumble along naked with small mincing steps tethered on a leash behind one of her captors…sweat beginning to gloss her skin as she strained to move her shackled feet fast enough…struggling to maintain her balance beneath the tormenting weight of the beam, her arms and shoulders aching…and for the first time in her life ashamed at being naked, aware of her breasts and belly and especially the thatch of golden hair below.

They forced her to her knees between the two wooden posts. The noose tightened. She opened her mouth to gasp for air and a thick cloth was shoved behind her teeth. One of the guards held her head while the other blindfolded her and wrapped a length of fabric around her mouth holding the gag firmly in place. The big one pushed a doughy clay-like substance into her ears. Finished now, he took hold of the end of the rope and stood behind her, lifting the noose so it pressed against her throat and held her head up.

Naked…on her knees…ankles chained…arms stretched, strapped, crucified…blind, gagged, deaf…all she could hear was the crashing of her heart against her ribs, racing with fear…

Time passed slowly. Her heart slowed. She concentrated on the pounding of her heart, counting each beat, trying to gauge how much time was passing, trying to occupy her mind with thoughts other than torture and pain. How long had she been bound there on her knees? An hour? Two hours? She swayed slightly, her body tiring under the burden of the cross, her balance compromised by the loss of sight. Every time she leaned forward more than a few degrees an unseen hand tightened the noose around her neck and brought her back. It was a subtle reminder that her body no longer belonged to her, but to her captors.

She had often thought about capture, about how she would be interrogated and tortured if she were caught. She had even fantasized about it. It was, she had said to herself, a way of preparing – just in case. In her imagination she did not resist as she was strapped to the torture table, accepting the inevitable and not wasting her strength with useless struggles. She was naked, always she was spread-eagled naked on the table. When the first charge of electricity surged through her breasts her body arched uncontrollably, but she made no sound other than that of gasping for breath. They shocked her again, longer and harder. They moved the contacts, inserting one in her vagina and clipping the other to her clitoris. She couldn't control the bucking and writhing of her body in the throes of agony but she fought the screams that welled up in her throat. The torture went on and on, punctuated with demands for information. They used whips and pliers and red hot needles. She used Eastern meditation techniques to help quell the pain. But always the torture won and the pain tore through the walls she had constructed to keep it out. Sometimes in her fantasy she bit her lip till the blood flowed and remained silent. Sometimes she started screaming when the pain became unbearable. But she never begged and she never talked. Always they gave up and stopped the torture when they saw she couldn't be broken.

But Chang wouldn't. He would not stop hurting her until she talked or died, and death would be impossibly long coming. She knelt before her captors with her arms bound to the wooden beam, spread wide as though inviting their torture devices to her naked body. But there were no wires clipped to her nipples, no soldering iron on the soles of her feet. And although she was totally open and exposed she felt as though she were being crushed inside a shrinking iron box, the top pressing down on her shoulders, unable to see or hear.

But she could feel. She could feel the sweat trickle down her face and sides, feel the droplets gather above her lip and on her nipples. She could feel the weight on her shoulders that seemed to grow heavier with each passing moment. Feel her knees aching, and her back. Feel a cool breeze on her sweat soaked skin.

A draft.. She was alert. The air in the torture chamber had been hot and close with no circulation. It had gone unnoticed until she felt the cooler air on her bared skin. Immediately she knew; a door had opened. She could not see or hear it but she was sure it had opened. And she knew who had walked through it and what it meant. Her stomach tightened and for a brief moment she came close to panic. In minutes, maybe seconds, her serious torture would begin.

Although blind and deaf she could feel Chang was walking around her, studying her, deciding how to proceed with her torture as she knelt bound and naked before him.

The two guards took hold of the crossbar and pulled her to her feet. She swayed precariously for a moment, her toes curling to grip the rough concrete of the floor. She could not see the guard take the loose wire and pass it over the chain that held her ankles, between her legs and back to the post behind her. But she sensed his head near her belly and a moment later felt the wire brush against the inside of her thigh.

Once the wire has been secured behind her, Chang had her blindfold and gag removed and the clay taken from her ears. The first thing she saw was the six Korean military officers standing in front of her, watching her with stony faces that betrayed no expression…unless one looked into their eyes and saw the lust. Chang walked forward, and without a word or even a glance in her direction, turned the crank. Megan felt the wire pressing into the left side of her crotch, then against her labium, rolling over her flesh and sliding to the center of her vagina between her lips. He stopped turning. Only then did Megan look down. The wire was horrifyingly thin; it would cut through her pussy like a hot knife through butter. The wire pressed against her sex digging into her perineum but there was no real pain yet.

"Well, Mrs. Roosevelt?" Chang mocked. Megan did not answer. She stood trembling with the strain of holding the beam, panting for breath, waiting for him to start the wire up into her sex. She was naked and helpless in the hands of the enemy and totally dependent on his mercy, which of course was nonexistent. She knew it, and worse, so did he. Megan could cry all she wanted, beg and finally scream for him to stop. He would laugh at her, taunt her and continue her torture. The only way she would be able to end her pain would be to betray Susan, and she could never do that.

She could not meet his eyes; she was humiliated beyond words. "Where is your sense of humor now, Miss Ohare." Megan looked up, startled and frightened by the use of her name. What else did he know? For a moment she almost surrendered to the hopelessness of her task It was more than simply the hours of slow and careful torture Chang had undoubtedly already planned for her. He knew her name and that for some reason had made her nudity and her pain and her humiliation before him intensely intimate.

Chang turned the crank again and a ratchet clicked over just once, barely audible in the large room. The wire pressed more insistently into Megan's vagina. Chang said nothing, simply stared hard at his captive, drawing out the preamble to the serious pain that everyone in the room knew would soon reduce her to something a little less than human. But just as the Koreans were preparing her for a more brutal torture, she set about preparing herself to endure it. What was happening to her, what was going to happen to her, could not be allowed to touch more than her body.

She calls on the years of Zen training, the meditation, the mental discipline. She begins to disassociate herself from her body. In spite of the pain of the wire cutting into her vagina, of the beam pressing down on her shoulders, almost immediately she begins to feel herself floating away. At that moment she feels a sharp probing at her breast, then her side, then her stomach. But already it is someone else who is being stabbed at. She has begun to watch the tableau from somewhere outside herself and from far across the room she can see Chang walking around her, examining her, pressing her flesh with a riding crop, or a swagger-stick, it is hard to tell from that distance.

Our observer is detached as she watches Chang begin to tap the wire with his crop. The prisoner can sense the observer looking at her. A thin trickle of blood runs down the inside of the naked girl's thigh. The observer can feel the pain but it does not hurt, it is not her pain. Nonetheless she groans as Chang strikes the wire harder and it vibrates and cuts her deeper into the prisoner's pussy. Now he brings the short whip across her breasts, her belly and her hips before striking the wire again and again and again.

Our observer feels her control slipping. She is beginning to feel the prisoner's pain. Megan is shifting her weight from one foot to another, trying to raise up on her toes, trying to lift herself from the wire that presses into her so diabolically, that moves and cuts and hurts her so. She is gasping for breath, groaning and shaking her head the few inches allowed by the timber that binds her arms and presses against her neck.

The observer is gone. The ethereal sense of detachment has vanished. It is only Megan who fights the pain. She is no longer watching her torture from across the room. The pain is too great and she has lost this battle within minutes of its onset. Chang is going to tear agony from every fiber of her body until she talks. She is going to suffer. She allows herself a long low moan.

TWO: MEGAN IS STRIPPED AND BOUND

Megan was barley aware of the wire falling away from between her thighs, of the cross piece being seized by the guards, of her being dragged across the chamber. Only when the bucket of cold water was dashed over her face did she begin to comprehend her position.

She was lying face up, still bound to the timber that crucified her arms, her head resting on the wood, her back and buttocks against the concrete floor. Her long legs rose straight up from her hips, then bent at a ninety degree angle at the knee so her calves were parallel with the floor. She was forced into this position by stock-like device that clamped her slim ankles so tightly that her feet were held virtually immobile.

Megan was staring up into the dimly lit expanse of the high ceiling. She tried to shake her head to clear the remaining cobwebs that seemed to cling to her thoughts but found she couldn't move her head from side to side. She tried to lift her head but that too was impossible and the movement of her head pulled painfully at her scalp. Her hair had been braided and tied off at the center of the wooden bar with a thin leather strap. It held her head immobile and forced her to stare up, where she now saw Chang standing above her, grinning broadly.

"You have performed admirably so far Miss Ohare. Your masters would be proud of you. Not one scream yet, hardly a peep. Of course I have barely started working on you…"

Megan's eyes closed in an involuntary reaction to Chang's words – "barely started working on you," said in the same flat uninflected tone with which he might have said "Pass the salt, please." Yet she knew he was enjoying it, all of it – the sight of her naked and helpless, her humiliation, her suffering. She could not bear to open her eyes and see his smug grin of self-satisfaction.

She felt her shoulders being raised and she knew that two of Chang's thugs were lifting the beam. When her body was at a 45° angle with the floor, her thighs and her torso forming a vee with her buttocks at the apex, they stopped.

"Look Miss Ohare," Chang said, "Open your eyes and see what comes next." Megan kept her eyes closed. Chang slapped her across the mouth, hard enough to split her lip but not too forcefully. With her head so tightly secured he could have broken her neck. She ran the tip of her tongue along her lower lip tasting the blood; still she did not open her eyes.

"I am afraid I must insist," he said. For a moment there was nothing; then a sharp pain in her nipple, a pain that grew and grew as Chang forced the steel needle deeper into the pebbled flesh of her aureole until her eyes flew open. Through her tears of pain she saw her feet raised two feet above the ground, locked in an iron device that consisted of an iron bar, upon which her ankles rested, and four screws five inches high and a half-inch in diameter, two on either side of each ankle. She could not see the simple mechanism that allowed the screws to slide along a slot in the bar so they could be adjusted and tightened around a torture victim's feet. But what she could see was that the screws were positioned just below her slim ankle bones and tightened to the point that they allowed no sideways movement of her feet. For good measure another slotted steel bar had been lowered over the screws and then wing nuts turned down on top of all four until any further tightening would have started to crack the bones in her ankles. It hurt, it hurt a lot, but it was the prospect of what was going to be done to her delicate feet that made Megan groan deep in her throat.

"The next stage of your torture will now begin Miss Ohare. If you do not reveal the information I request there will be a third stage, and a fourth up to ten. It is part of an ancient tradition. Each stage has been designed to not only hurt you but weaken your body and your will. But I promise you, you will not get past stage five before you are begging me to allow you to talk. Yes, it has all been quite carefully planned. Would you like to hear more?"

For the first time since she had been brought down into the torture chamber Megan spoke, "Fuck you, you slant-eyed creep."

"Ahh. If cursing me will help you keep your courage up, by all means indulge yourself. I will only tell you this: each stage has a purpose beyond merely causing you intolerable pain. You must be well aware that I could have hurt you a lot more than I did by having you bound to the wooden beam and pressing a wire into your vagina. Even at that, please consider that I could have tightened the wire a lot further. But my objective is not to hurt you, it is to break you to my will. And pain is the shortest road to that city."

Chang's voice had started to rise and for the first time Megan saw real emotion. Excitement. Sexual excitement. And it scared her. A new dimension had been added to the equation – the possibility that even if she talked he might continue her torture, keeping her alive and in agony to satisfy his lust.

He was bending over her, shouting now. "To make you do anything I wish. And what I wish," here he grabbed her face and squeezed her jaw hard, "is that you tell me everything about your intelligence operation starting with the name and contact information of your partner." He released his grip and straightened up, trying to control his breathing which was hissing through his nose and regain control of his composure. When he leaned back down toward her he spoke in a quiet measured voice, "It just so happens that torture is the most efficient way to break you and get that information."

Chang held the slender needle, now stained with the blood from her breast, a short distance in front of her face, but not so close that she could not focus her eyes on it. It was at least five centimeters long and the steel shimmered smooth and shiny even in the soft light of the torture chamber. "Sergeant Wie will now insert this needle under one of your toe nails, the small one on your right foot. He will do it slowly and with much care so as to cause you as much pain as possible. If you do not reveal the name of your partner he will move on to the small toe on the left foot, then the next toe on the right, and so on and so on. Your agony will grow with each needle, and although I am sure a woman with such stupid pride as yourself will resist, you will not be able to hold back first your screams, then your begging, and eventually the information I want. If you have not given me what I want when the last needle is slipped under your large toenail we will move on to stage three."

"I'll never talk you sick fuck. You might make me scream but I'll never talk. I'll die first."

"No, Miss Ohare, you will not die, you will suffer." He reached out without taking his eyes form Megan and the guard took the needle from him. "You may begin Wie."

THREE: FOOT TORTURE

They did not lower the wooden beam but held it so Megan remained lifted from the floor in a position to watch her torture. She saw the needle in Wie's hand, saw him smile. She closed her eyes and waited; squeezed them as tightly shut as possible like a little girl waiting for an injection or something scary in a movie to pass. But when she felt Wie's fingers grasp her little toe her eyes flew open and she stared in horrified fascination as he moved the needle toward her nail.

Wie pressed the length of the needle against the tip of her toe so the tip of the needle was pointed straight up and touching the underside of her nail where it extended beyond her toe. At the touch of the metal against her skin Megan jerked her ankles back toward her but they did not move a centimeter, held fast by the vice-like grip of the metal bars.

"Wait," Chang said in Korean, and then to Megan, "I do not know if you noticed but these needles are specially formed. I have had them made for the sole purpose of sliding between the nail and the delicate skin that adheres beneath. The point tapers out quickly to a wide and very, very thin shaft." He held one of the small instruments of torture in front of Megan's eyes so she could examine it. It was two inches long and about an eighth of an inch wide. She couldn't stifle a groan at the thought of that obscene piece of metal being worked under her toenail. "The bottom is flat and the top slightly rounded. This will enable Wie to slide it quite easily between your nail and the skin that adheres to it, while extracting the maximum in pain from the procedure. I have different lengths for each of your toes. It is really quite an improvement over the bamboo slivers that were once used. I do not think you will enjoy it half as much as Wie and I will, not to mention our guests."

By "our guests," she knew he meant the six Korean officers who had watched her torment on the wire, and whom she now knew were still in the chamber watching her torture continue. She also realized that Chang was Chinese, on loan from Beijing she assumed. And a new fear gripped her heart – that after her interrogation she would be spirited away into China or North Korea where she would disappear into a prison to spend what remained of her life alone, being abused and tortured.

Megan did not know when it was she started screaming. It even took her a few seconds to realize that the agonized shrieks that echoed throughout the chamber were actually her own.

Wie had started by inserting the tip of the needle under the nail of the small toe of her right foot. The pain was immediate and grew rapidly as the razor-edged sides of the point came into play. Her naked body seemed to seep sweat from every pore and she began to grunt through clenched teeth with every breath. She wanted to throw her head back and scream but her head was bound tightly to the beam and she fought to keep silent, to deny Chang the pleasure of hearing her confess her agony. Still she couldn't stop her body from shaking so violently that the two guards who held the beam had to tighten their grips.

When he was through with the first toe the guards lowered the beam to the floor. Megan lay moaning and gasping for breath. "Who is your partner? How do you contact her?" Chang barked at her. Even as Chang was speaking she felt Wie grasp the little toe on her left foot. "No," she groaned. "No…no…no," and not even Megan knew if she were denying Chang his information or beseeching him not to insert the next needle.

When she stopped screaming the guards once again lifted the beam. This time she did not close her eyes, but the sight of the five long needles protruding from her nails, of the blood that dripped down her toes and seeped from beneath the sides of her nails, horrified her and she almost retched. The feet trapped so helplessly in the iron stocks did not seem real, couldn't still be hers, but the pain insisted they were.

Chang held a cup of water to her lips and she opened her mouth. He poured the water slowly into her mouth and she swallowed it greedily gulping it down as quickly as she could. A second cup followed and then a third. Her body ran with sweat and demanded to be hydrated. She obeyed that command so intently she never felt Wie's fingers on her toe.

The scream never left her throat as Wie started the needle under her nail. As she gasped in the air that would be expelled in a shriek of the damned, she aspirated the water that remained in her mouth. She started to cough, spewing some of the water in a mist in front of her, but with her head and arms locked so tightly she could not expel enough of it. Quickly the two goons who held the beam returned it to the floor while she wheezed for air between racking coughs. Her lithe body heaved between her pinioned ankles and her crucified arms, the heavy timber lurching by inches with each desperate cough as she fought for breath. The pain from her tortured feet was still there but no longer all encompassing as breathing and the agony burning her lungs became the only thoughts in her head.

Wie waited until the coughs were more reflexive than urgent before he started the needle moving again. Now Megan's screams were those of an insane woman, propelled by a need to voice her pain as great as her need to breathe and unhampered by any logic or desire not to show her weakness. As with the previous five needles Wie steered this one down the length of the nail and under the cuticle at the bottom until it pressed against the bone of the toe itself. It was at this point that Megan fainted.

Chang gave her no time to rest. A pail of icy water was dashed over her head and she woke immediately. She saw Chang staring down at her, his eyes running the length of her splayed naked figure before resting on her face. "Stop," she begged, "Oh God stop please stop."

"Only you can stop the torture Miss Ohare. Tell me what I want to know."

"Nooo," she wailed. "I can't. I can't. Have mercy on me. I can't."

"But you can Miss Ohare. And you will. Look at you, naked and helpless. The only thing you can do to stop your torture is to talk. And you will."

The torture continued. More needles, more struggles, more screaming in pain. Megan stopped begging Chang and began begging God, crying out "Make it stop. Oh God make it stop," over and over between her agonized shrieking. They lifted her again, and again Chang pressed the cup of water to her lips. She refused to open them despite the terrible thirst and the sweat that ran in rivulets from her naked body. Strong fingers pressed into the pressure points at her jaw forcing her mouth open. Two strong hands held it agape and the water poured in. Megan gulped it down – two cups, three cups – steeling herself against the pain that would any moment explode from her foot. When it came it didn't matter. She gasped in agony inhaling the water and once again hacked and coughed and fought for air. This time Wie did not pause but pushed the needle further and further under the nail of her large toe. She couldn't scream. She couldn't breathe. She was going to die. If she could have thought through the agony she would have welcomed it; it would be the end of her hellish torment. But her body fought for life. Coughing up water and gasping for air. Finally it was over, the coughing stopped and the needle was fixed deep in her toe. She lay on her back, legs slightly spread and locked above her, arms outstretched and fixed to the heavy wooden crosspiece. Sobbing and moaning, she looked up at her torturers who stood above her staring down as she lay helplessly on the floor.

"Ten needles Miss Ohare. You did very well I must admit. Screaming is to be expected, and your pleading for mercy is hardly worth mentioning. In a fair world you would be rewarded; in my world you have won nothing but even more painful torture."

Chang walked the few steps to the stocks that imprisoned Megan's bare feet. Carefully he placed his fingers on each of her large toes, the thumb resting on top of the nail. Even this rather benign touch drew a quick intake of air from his captive, and a short low cry that dissolved into a moan. Then he squeezed. Megan screamed. Chang smiled.

Chang walked over to where Megan was bound to the beam and looked down on her. Megan lay still now, the only sound coming from her, was her rapid shallow breathing. Moments before her nude body had been writhing uncontrollably. She had struggled, desperately if uselessly. She tore with all her strength at her bondage but it was a mindless act; there was no possible escape, her ankles and wrists remained securely fettered. Rivulets of sweat had run over her body and flown into the air with her wild gyrations. She had screamed as she had never screamed before and then screamed even louder until she fainted. Twice she fainted and twice they revived her with cold water and continued her torture. When they paused in the torture to get a new needle or to shout questions at her she had begged, not Chang, but God; begged Him to make it stop, to have mercy on her and finally to let her die. God did not answer, the torture did not stop, she did not die. But she did not talk. And now she lay quietly and looked up at Chang and waited for him to torture her some more.

"Wie, the big toenails, two more needles in each."

FOUR: A SHORT TOUR OF THE TORTURE CHAMBER

They broke an ammonia capsule under her nose. It cleared her head. Her feet throbbed, if that word can be used to denote pounding unrelenting pain. But compared to the actual insertion of the needles it was almost nothing. "We are through with the needles Miss Ohare." As Chang spoke Wie busied himself freeing Megan's pain racked feet from the iron restraints. "You are probably relieved to hear that. You shouldn't be. In a few minutes time you will suffer torments a hundred times worse.

"Save yourself more useless pain. Give me the names. Before I am done with you will be screaming out all your precious information as fast as you can, begging me to listen to you and stop hurting you."

Megan said nothing, just concentrated on what she had to do – resist the overwhelming urge to tell her torturer everything and stop the pain.

"Look at yourself!" Chang shouted, and nodded his head at the two thugs that knelt at Megan's head. They lifted the beam and with it her outstretched arms and head so she could see her feet with the fourteen needles protruding from underneath her toenails, fourteen shiny black shafts that pierced her very soul, available for Chang or Wie to use to cause her even more terrible pain. To be pushed or pressed or banged with a hammer. Or heated! What if they held a torch to the metal? What would it be like to have the flesh under her nails slowly broiled? Megan moaned.

Wie had her ankles in his hands. Megan prayed he would not squeeze her toes, then realized it was senseless; if he did not it was only because Chang had worse in mind for her. It was useless. She would suffer the torments of hell until they had mercy on her and let her die, whether she talked or not.

The guards began to lift the crossbeam higher. A second before she was upright Megan cried in horror, "Oh God no!" The second "No!" dissolved into a scream of pain. She tried to shift her weight onto her heels but the heavy timber strapped across her shoulders pressed it forward on her bare feet driving the nails even deeper into her toes. It was too much. Her legs quivered, then buckled, and Megan collapsed to the floor, twisting to the side as she fell so the crosspiece hit end first, then toppled so she crashed onto her back. There was another scream and then she lay there helplessly – dazed, naked and in pain.

They unfastened her hair from the beam and slipped the rope with the noose over her head. Then they used the smelling-salts again and let her lay there a minute before hoisting her back up. This time she stood without falling, sobbing deeply and shaking like a leaf.

Again she was led like a dog on a leash, naked and weeping, crying out in pain with each agonizing step. Wie did not rush her, savoring her torment and humiliation. Chang watched her closely, watched how her shoulders sagged under the weight of the timber, how she struggled to keep her head up, how her body stiffened with each halting step.

"Perhaps you would like to see some of the instruments I have at my disposal Miss Ohare?"

Wie had stopped before a massive oak chair, its dark wood even darker where its prior occupants' sweat and blood had soaked into the wood. There were heavy straps spaced at three points along each leg and the same on each arm to immobilize the victim's limbs. Thin belts were attached to the sides to bind the prisoner fast to the high back, along with a collar and a leather headband to hold her totally motionless while she was being tortured. None of this was lost on Megan but her horror was overwhelmed by the agony and humiliation of her forced march around the torture chamber.

"I don't anticipate you will be spending any time in this chair, Miss Ohare. But not to worry. We have many other devices with which to restrain you while Wie continues your lesson in the futility of pride." Indeed, arrayed behind the chair and in Megan's view were a massive X-shaped cross replete with shackles and chains, a wooden frame with cross-members and leather restraints, and a table with iron manacles to spread wide her ankles and wrists while it held her at a 45 degree angle. She could only moan and then cry out in pain as a tug on her lead forced her forward once again.

Wie led her around the room again before stopping before shelving that ran floor to ceiling, in front of which was a long table. Hanging next to the shelving was a frame that held a two dozen whips – a short multi-lash affair with barbed tips that looked like the tentacles of an obscene squid, a seven foot long bullwhip and almost everything in between – and an equal number of canes and rods, from a willowy lash of split bamboo to a short thick cudgel of heavy ash. On the shelves was an assortment of instruments, some of which in another setting might have seemed benign – clamps and knives and pliers; but there could be no doubt that their only use in the white-hot atmosphere of the torture chamber would be to inflict unspeakable injury and pain. And then there were the other implements, the electric generator with the snake like wires ending in sharp-toothed alligator clips, the spiked metal plates fashioned into a press that seemed to cry out for soft flesh to crush and mangle, the thumbscrews and pears. On the table were vials and syringes and wide mouth covered glass vessels that would have seemed more at home in a chemistry laboratory than a torture chamber. Chang lifted the top of one and Megan's senses were immediately assaulted by an acrid miasma. She jerked her head away as best she could trying to escape the noxious fumes. Chang held a coin by large glass forceps which he lowered briefly into the clear liquid. He held it two feet in front of her face so she could see the metal blister and dissolve like sugar in hot tea. He stared pointedly at her soft breasts. "Think what a drop of this will feel like on the tip of your nipple, Miss Ohare."

Megan squeezed her eyes shut to protect them from the fumes that burned her nose and throat. "You bastard," she gasped at him between coughs, tears streaming down her cheeks from behind her closed eyelids, "You fucking sadistic bastard."

"Yes, yes. Perhaps you are beginning to understand. There is no hope for you, none at all. I will torture you in ways that will make acid dripping on your naked breasts seem like a holiday. I will break you Ohare. So talk, talk now."

"Never, you miserable fuck."

Chang motioned with his head to Wie. "Walk her around a little more and see if we can't wear down a little of that arrogance." Then to Megan, "It is for your own good my dear. The weaker you are the faster you will break. And even I take pity on you at the thought of how you are going to suffer in stage three."

FIVE: SECURED TO THE RACK

It took all her strength just to keep her legs moving, even at the painfully slow pace Wie set. But if she faltered they would simply pull her along with her feet dragging along the floor and the needles digging ever deeper under her nails. Exhausted, her cries of pain had been replaced by a continuous sobbing as she struggled not to stumble under the heavy timber as she was led about by the rope around her neck. By the finish the other two guards were needed to support Megan by the ends of the crosspiece. The once proud beauty now hung naked and helpless between the Korean captors, no longer stand.

"This is my rack," said Chang. "I am assuming a woman as educated as you knows how it is used, but believe me nothing can prepare you for the pain of being stretched on such a machine." The surface of the rack was a dull black color. The upper half appeared to be a simple table except for the winch at the very top. The lower half was much more bizarre…and frightening. It consisted of two six inch wide legs with ankle restraints of the same black material set in the end. The legs were attached to the top half by a semicircular hub. It was immediately obvious that the legs could be moved along the circumference of the hub by means of a crank that protruded from beneath the machine. Each turn of the crank would move the legs further apart, and with them Megan's thighs. It was at this moment she realized her tour of the torture chamber had come to an end.

There were no thoughts in Megan's head at that instant, just a picture of her in agony stretched naked on the rack with her legs spread wide and her pussy open and waiting for whatever horrible instruments Chang would use on her. There were no thoughts, just a instinct for survival as she swung her arms to the left tearing the crosspiece from her guards' grasp and striking one of them in the head.

It gained her nothing. There was no where she could go, her strength had been sapped by the hours of torture and she was still hideously bound to the wooden beam with fourteen steel needles driven under her toenails. The guard had not even been knocked off his feet by the blow from the beam. Still she struggled as they got their grip on the beam once again, and redoubled her efforts when she heard Chang's flat hard voice order, "Put her on."

Wie had hold of her ankles and Megan was lifted into the air. She fought desperately, but with her feet firmly gripped by Wie and her arms lashed to the timber she was helpless to prevent being laid out on the machine. Her frantic writhing and thrashing slowed the process but a few seconds and when she felt the cold surface of the rack on the bare flesh of her buttocks and back, she gave a cry of defiance and kicked her legs with all her might. It took all of Wie's strength to keep hold of her ankles and as soon as her upper body had been laid down on the torture table, one of the guards holding the timber scurried over to help bind her legs.

Megan ignored the pain that flashed up her legs from the imbedded nails, fighting and twisting against all hope to be free. It was useless. Within moments each of the guards at her feet had hold of an ankle and was locking it in one of the gyves. With the third guard holding her arms all she could do was arch her back and strain against her unyielding bonds.

When they had secured her ankles Wie and the other guard moved up to her arms. Quickly they unstrapped her from the beam and pulled it away. For a moment Megan's arms were free with no one holding them. A moment was all the trained agent needed. Despite the hours of torture she jerked herself into a sitting position and reached for Wie who was bent over at the side of the rack. But her arms didn't follow. They hung limply at her sides, numb and useless from the hours of bondage. Wie simply placed his hands on her shoulders and pressed her backwards where the other two were waiting to bind her wrists.

"Fuck!" Megan screamed and banged her head against the rack in frustration. By the time she felt the first tingling of feeling returning to her arms her torturers had stepped away. She twisted her neck to look upward at her right wrist and then twisted again to see her left. The manacles which bound her of the same webbed material that had held her to the timber and were attached to thick ropes that ran to the winch. Her arms were pulled over her head but there was still just enough slack in them for her to lift her shoulders from the rack and look down the length of her long legs to where her ankles were tightly shackled. Chang moved the lever and the ropes began to pull at Megan's arms. She fought against pressure grunting with the effort but with each click the force became more irresistible until she was jerked back to the hard smooth surface of the rack. She gave one last pull trying to free her arms of the ropes before she surrendered, sweat glossed and panting from her struggles, and waited for whatever Chang had in store for her, determined to fight him to her last breath.

"You will notice there is no metal exposed anywhere near your body," she heard Chang intone, "Metal gears and such are all hidden beneath the composite top of my rack. That is so that when we use electro-torture we don't have to worry about shorting out the equipment." He was walking around his helpless prisoner, examining the naked body splayed out before him. Megan followed him with her eyes, not wanting to, but compelled, wanting to have some warning, even if only of one second, before he began working on her again. "That is one of the reasons I love the rack. Not only can I cause you the most horrible pain by stretching you, but at the same time I can use a hundred other techniques on you, some of them made even more exquisite by the fact your body will be taut and you will already be suffering the agonies of the damned." Chang patted Megan softly on her bare shoulder, a simple act that for reasons she did not understand was intensely personal and intimate and filled her with dread. "Now that I am done with my pretentious little speech, let us get on with your torture." He lifted his hand from her shoulder and turned it palm upward. "Gentlemen…"

At his invitation the six uniformed officers moved close to the rack, three on each side. "You may touch her if you wish," he said in Korean, but only two did, one squeezing her left breast and another rubbing his hand along the inside of her thigh. "You sick bastard," she said to Chang who was at her head looking down, "You sick sadistic bastard," her voice controlled but no more than a whisper. "It helps in this job," he smiled, and grasped the lever that would begin to stretch her. Megan closed her eyes and silently prayed she would die before she talked.

SIX: STRETCHED

Each time Chang moved the lever toward Megan's head the gears hidden beneath the rack made a loud click. With each click her wrists were pulled a quarter inch farther up from her body. He could move the lever five clicks before it was stopped by an iron peg that protruded from the side of the rack. Moving the lever back toward her feet was silent and did not effect the tension on the ropes. If he wanted to loosen the ropes there was a short bar next to the lever that reversed the ratcheting action of the gears. There was another switch that changed the gearing so the quarter inch could be reduced to an eighth and even further to one sixteenth. As he stretched Megan's body tighter and tighter he would reduce the increments so as to prolong her suffering. When she was taut even one sixteenth of an inch would be agonizing beyond belief. At the moment he was stretching Megan's arms upward at one quarter inch per click.

Megan counted the clicks. She did this for no discernable reason. With her eyes closed she felt her arms slowly straightening, moving in closer to her head as much as they moved up closer to the winch. She needed to see. At the eleventh click she opened her eyes and craned back her head. It was harder now that the slack had been taken up in the ropes binding her wrists. It hurt her neck. The ropes disappeared under the spool of the winch near the center so her wrists were being drawn in as well as up. Her arms were pulled straight now and pressing against the sides of her head.

Megan let her head slide back to the surface of the rack. The machine clicked again, and yet again. The sensation of strain in her shoulders and hips was replaced by pain, real pain and not just the ache of overextended muscles. Staring down at her and waiting for the pain to become agony, for her to start screaming and begging, were the six Korean officers. The one with his hand between her thighs was smiling, or perhaps smirking. The others all seemed to have narrowed their eyes in anticipation of her first tormented howl. She wanted to shout at them, to curse them, to tell them how worthless they and their primitive totalitarian country was – but it was she who was at their mercy. It was she who was helpless and degraded. It was she who was worthless. It was they who could do whatever they wished to her, hurt her, make her cry for mercy.

She couldn't look at their smug faces anymore, couldn't stand their smiles of self importance and superiority. So Megan looked up toward the inky blackness of the ceiling. But it wasn't black, not even dark. It was well lighted, or rather the mirror suspended not two meters above her was well lighted.

Of course it was not the mirror that Megan saw but her own image stretched naked on the rack. The powerful muscles in her thighs and arms stood out in stark relief to her bare skin that shone with sweat. Her stomach was etched and hard, her navel stretched into an elliptical slit that was barely visible. She groaned and turned her head away, closing her eyes as she did. The effect was exactly what Chang had anticipated, for Megan's reaction was the same as his previous victims. The sight of themselves nude, helpless and spread out for torture was more than any of his girls could bear to see.

Chang said nothing but pressed his advantage, quickly moving the lever three notches and stretching Megan's body three-quarters of an inch. To the tightly stretched young beauty it felt as though ice picks had been driven into her shoulder joints and hips. She gasped in pain and her eyes flew open in surprise. They met Chang's cool gaze. "Now the real pain starts," he said, his voice flat, his face expressionless. She wanted to respond, to tell him to go fuck himself, or to tell him what a sick prick he was, or say something clever, but when she opened her mouth nothing but a long moan escaped her lips. From the corner of her eye she saw Chang's hand move and she gave a short cry of alarm but there was no further stretching of her body. Chang laughed as he adjusted the increment to an eighth inch. "How do you expect to resist me when even my slightest movement fills you with fear? Tell me the name of your partner and I will stop the torture."

Megan turned her head away and closed her eyes. She couldn't. Even if they brought her to the point of absolute surrender, even if they broke her so completely that her loyalties to her country, her oath and the Firm dissolved in the acid of agony, she could never betray Susan. Never.

Chang moved the lever and the ropes pulled Megan's wrists an eighth inch further from her ankles. The insteps of her bare feet were now drawn with such force against the shackles that it felt as though her ankles were being crushed. Blood seeped from her manacled wrists where the webbing had torn away the flesh. The excruciating pain in her shoulders and hips spiked even higher and was now doubled in her elbows and knees. Another click and Megan again screamed in agony. Her head had been pushed onto her biceps as her arms were pulled up and in by the irresistible pressure of the rack. She heard noises from deep within her taut body that sounded like the creak of a ship's timbers. And there was new pain, pain that enveloped her from groin to ribs as though her insides were being stretched and crushed at the same time. I can't take anymore, she thought, oh God help me I can't take anymore. Again Chang stretched her that tiny eighth of an inch and again Megan screamed, but this time her shriek of pain was short and sharp. She hadn't the breath anymore to howl out her pain. Her soft full breasts were stretched flat on her chest leaving only her nipples stiff and erect, rising and falling rapidly on her heaving rib cage.

Chang's hands ran over her body, testing the tension with an experienced touch. Megan was aware only of new pain in her joints as his long fingers probed and searched. "I think that will do for now," he said to no one in particular, and then to Wie, "You may start the bastinado."

SEVEN: BASTINADO AND WHIPPING WHILE RACKED

The order was given in Korean, except the word "bastinado." In other circumstances Megan would have noted how odd the rather mellifluous Spanish sounded admixed with the harsh bite of the Asian language, and she would have made a mental note to research if there were any Korean equivalent for the torture of beating a victim viciously on the soles of the feet. She did know, as a student of history and language, that the word – and most probably the practice – dated to the inquisition. But she might have wondered how Chang had come to know the word and why he would choose to use it, especially to an uneducated thug like Wie.

But Megan did not think any of this; in fact she did not hear the words spoken at all. Her agony had reached the point that her entire world was a red film of pain. She not only felt the pain, but saw it, heard it, breathed it. The only words in her head were Oh God let it end Oh God let it end Oh God let it end…

Wie used a stiff rubber pipe, 50 mm in diameter and a meter long. Each blow to the soles of her shackled feet reverberated up her taut body in a wave of pain. Her mouth gaped open and her lips trembled as she gasped for air between blows. Her lungs burned with her desperate effort to breathe. She was stretched so tight by the rack that anything more than rapid shallow breaths were impossible. But above it all was the unholy pain of the bastinado. With her body held rigid, each blow made her spine vibrate like an overstretched violin string. She wanted to scream – needed to scream out her pain as Wie drove the pipe into her bare feet again and again with mind numbing force; oh how she tried to scream, but she was stretched too tight, and all that she could manage were agonized grunts each time Wie smashed the pipe into her bared soles.

Wie worked on Megan with care and patience, spacing the blows anywhere from thirty seconds to two minutes apart, giving the tortured girl time to recover from the shock each time he struck her. He would watch her carefully, wait until the initial spasms of agony had passed and she could again breathe in the rapid gasping rhythm that her bondage allowed. Then she would begin to struggle, pulling at her shackles, trying to escape the ropes the stretched her, that held her naked body open for the next blow. She had to break free; she couldn't just lie there and wait for the searing pain to again take possession of her soul…she couldn't, but she was racked so tightly that her desperate fight against the ropes was reduced to her clawing at the air with her long slim fingers. And when even this pathetic resistance had ceased Wie would strike her bare soles again…and again…and again…

Over and over Wie brought the cudgel against the bottoms of Megan's feet until finally she could bear no more. Chang watched her clawing fingers splay out and stiffen, saw her eyes roll back in her head, her mouth open wide in a soundless shriek. He moved the lever back easing the tension on his victim's body, keeping her stretched tightly but giving her enough slack to inhale sufficient air to keep her conscious. She looked up at him, panic clearly written on her face along with her suffering. He smiled beneficently down on her even while Wie was drawing his arm back to resume the beating.

But now Wie used a thin fiberglass switch that had a raised ridge down either side. It was quite long, over a meter long, and very flexible. As a result it bent like a fly rod as Wie started his stroke and it sang in a high pitched whine as it cut through the air.

It felt to Megan as though they had driven a cleaver through the center of her foot; through the skin, through the flesh, through the bone. That was her first thought and then the pain overwhelmed her and she could no longer think. But she could scream. Chang had loosened the ropes enough that she could fill her lungs with air and fill the torture chamber with her mindless shrieks of pain. She howled in agony, then screamed for mercy and begged for them to stop. And she writhed. Her naked body twisted and convulsed uncontrollably against her bonds as she screamed, more than once managing to lift herself off the rack, bending in a shallow arc from her heels to her shoulders, all in a vain effort to tear her ankles from the stocks that held them fast.

And that was what her crazed struggles were about – of course the pain but even more so her utter helplessness and complete vulnerability. This was the source of her immediate terror – to be bound and stretched and laid open so totally, to be able to do nothing, her desperate struggles reduced to pitiful writhing, her screams for mercy unanswered by God and laughed at by her captors.

Wie alternated between her feet, slashing first one and then slowly walking to the other side of the rack – his eyes never leaving Megan's undulating body – before slashing the other. Each crack of the switch bringing new screams from Megan's aching throat and leaving a thin line of blood on her bared sole. Ten, twenty, thirty times Wie lashed her feet , a fine spray of claret now attending each blow. Megan was exhausted, not only from her struggles but from the horrible pain that sapped her strength as well as her will.

Finally Chang held up his hand for Wie to stop and lifted his victim's head, her face still beautiful despite the agony which etched lines in her flesh, and slowly fed her water. She drank greedily, the clear liquid soothing her throat burning from the constant shrieking. When he laid her head gently back on her up-stretched arms his eyes met hers and he asked softly, "Ready to talk Miss Ohare?" Megan moaned once, closed her eyes and began to sob uncontrollably.

The flail came down again but this time across Megan's shins. "Nooooo," she wailed, "Stop! Oh God please stop!" But Wie did not stop. He worked his way up her shins and thighs in the same slow methodical manner in which he had shredded her poor feet. The whip fell across her hips and it suddenly dawned on Megan that no part of her body was to be spared. She twisted her head toward Chang. "Make him stop," she begged, "Please please make him stop make him stop make him ahhhhhhh." Her desperate plea dissolved into a rush of breath as the flail came down across her belly.

He whipped her stomach, her ribs, her breasts – the ridge on the fiberglass finally ripping into her distended nipples with such force that it left Megan jerking spasmodically, her mouth gaping open but emitting no sound until she managed to croak "No more. I…I…can't take…any more. I'll talk. You win…I'll talk…just…no more…torture"

Once more Chang held up his hand and Wie stopped the whipping. "Then just to get us started give me the operation code name."

Megan's head was rolling slowly from side to side as she moaned at Chang "No more…stop… I beg you…stop…stop…please… stop…"

Wie raised the fiberglass rod over Megan's breasts and looked to Chang, who shook his head, "She is broken. She is ours. More torture is not needed but," and he smiled at the Korean, "perhaps when she has given us what we need…"

EIGHT: INSUFFICIENT INFORMATION

It took a full twenty minutes for Chang to calm Megan to the point of lucidity. He fed her cool water and stroked her head and promised he would not torture her anymore, as long as she cooperated. And she talked. She did not wait for Chang to ask questions but let the words spill out of her mouth, sometimes in whispers, sometimes in shouts and sometimes in groans and sobs. She rattled on for over an hour, interspersing her narrative with pleas for Chang not to hurt her, the begging coming at random intervals completely disconnected from the information relating to her espionage: "In the States I report to Langley…to Langley…every week…no, sometimes twice…please no more torture I beg you no more torture…call…get number or drop…" Everything was of course recorded and most of it was of questionable utility although undoubtedly accurate. None of it interested Chang, or for that matter, the Koreans, none of whom spoke English. But they watched with interest, and with admiration for the way their Chinese guest had reduced his strong willed captive to a compliant slave.

Chang started interrupting Megan's stream of consciousness with questions, questions concerning matters in which he had more interest, slowly increasing the sensitivity of the subject matter, no wanting to bring the poor girl up short or even give her pause as to the wisdom of continued cooperation. He handled it perfectly and Megan didn't hesitate for an instant, pouring out the secrets as though they were the heaviest burden in the world. Still she interspersed her monologue with pleas for mercy and every couple of minutes begged Chang to loosen the rack…" please just a little…please please please…"

Chang ignored her pleas and she continued to talk and he continued to listen until he sensed that she had reached the end of information that could be of any use to him. Then he asked without changing his tone from the scores of other questions he had put to her, "Who is your contact in Korea?"

Megan's mouth opened and closed once, twice before she stammered, "I…I don't know."

"I will ask you once again, who is your contact?"

Megan lifted her head the scant millimeters allowed by the rack, "I don't know! I swear I don't know!"

"I am losing my patience. Do you wish me to resume your torture?"

"NO! NO! I swear I don't know! Listen to me…for the love of God listen. You have to believe me! I was never told. You know that…they would never tell me. In case I was captured…In case I was tortured…"

"What is his name! Or do I stretch your further?!"

"NO!" she screamed. "It's not a man…it's a woman. Susan, her name is Susan."

Chang snorted. "I assure you in all of Korea there is no one named Susan."

"That's what they called her! That's all I know!" Megan was shrieking now, shrieking and sobbing. Chang said nothing but moved his hand to the lever. "NOOOO!" she screamed, "Oh God don't stretch me! I'm telling the truuuuu…" Megan's words turned into a high pitched wail as Chang moved the lever one stop.

"It might be, Miss Ohare. But there is no reason for me to believe you. If you are telling the truth you will die the most horrid death imaginable under the slowest and most painful torture I can devise. That is too bad for you but means nothing to me. If you are lying then perhaps I will get the truth. You see Megan, there is no reason for me to believe you." He moved the lever one more stop and Megan screamed again.

"You monster," she managed to gasp and for one moment she regained her old spirit, her eyes flashing hate, but that moment evaporated when Chang once more reached for the lever. Once again she began to sob in pain and fear and beg Chang for mercy, and when Chang didn't answer, to beg God for death.

God too did not answer and Megan continued to suffer. Chang did in fact believe that Megan probably did not know the true identity of the mole inside the DPRK. It would have been an unimaginable breech of security for her handlers to have revealed the identity to her if there was no need for her to know. However, if that were true why had they smuggled her into Korea? It probably had been simply because that was the best, and perhaps the only way to get the information from "Susan." But it could have been to pull the mole out, or some other reason that would have required Megan to have a more intimate knowledge of her contact's identity. What tipped the balance to Chang thinking that Megan did not know the true identity was first how long she had held out under his torture, and then how completely she had tried to cooperate once she had broken. In the final analysis it did not matter. There was simply no good reason to stop torturing his prisoner other than human decency, a quality Chang did not have in sufficient abundance.

In fact Chang was enjoying watching Megan suffer, an enjoyment he found enhanced by the possibility she might be telling the truth and have no idea of "Susan's" identity. If that were the case then she was helpless to stop her torture, and made her begging and swearing all the more delicious to the Chinese torture master.

Chang stretched Megan just short of dislocating her shoulders, then held her taut body there for fifteen minutes, savoring her moans and the tears that ran down her cheeks. He watched her carefully, gauging the strain on her body, how her muscles and tendons slowly adjusted to their extreme stretch, easing the pressure but not the pain. He moved the lever one more notch and from somewhere deep in her chest Megan found the air to scream in pain, one long high shriek before she fell to the job of gasping in air to stay alive. Again Chang let her lie on her bed of pain but now her muscles could no longer adjust to the terrible pressure and instead tightened further in a desperate effort to defend themselves.

All the pain Megan had suffered in Chang's torture chamber paled in comparison to this unrelenting agony. Unable to find the breath with which to cry out her torment or beg him to stop, all she could do when he reached for the lever again was move her head weakly from side to side and whisper "No…no." But instead of tightening the winch another fraction and tearing Meagan's arms from their shoulder joints, he moved the gearing into reverse and loosened the rack's unbearable tension.

For the briefest of moments Megan's heart leapt with the thought that her ordeal was over, that Chang believed her and was ending her torture. But almost immediately her body was torn by new pain as it tried to adjust to the relaxed tension, and now able to fill her lungs with air, she began a new round of uncontrollable screaming. She shuddered and writhed to the extent that the loosened ropes of the rack would allow, her screams turning to heaving sobs as the new pain slowly abated. And as it eased and she could again think with some semblance of reason, hope stole back into her heart. The pain was unavoidable with the loosening of the rack, not necessarily a new torture. Perhaps she was being released; why would they keep torturing her for information she did not have?

She looked up at Chang, his face immutable and unreadable as it stared down at the beautiful subject of his terrible ministrations. Between sobs she whimpered "No more... please…no more torture." Chang said nothing, simply continued to watch her writhe on the rack. Megan managed to raise her head off the table, straining toward Chang, beginning to panic at his lack of response. "Stop…I beg you…stop…please stop." Finally, in way of an answer, Chang began to once more stretch the helpless Megan.

Three more time Chang stretched Megan to the point just short of dislocating her limbs, held her there for unendurable minutes of agony while she struggled to breathe, unable to find the breath to scream or utter her pathetic pleas any louder than a whisper to, "Stop… please stop…I beg you…stop…stop…"

It was a torture designed to drive a prisoner mad: the agony – unrelenting yet constantly changing in form and degree, the moments of hope as the ropes were loosened that they would not be used to stretch her outraged body yet again, the despair that followed when the tension slowly increased and the growing certainty that her torturer would never cease tormenting her with endless cycles of pain.

The fourth time Chang stretched Megan taut but a full three notches short of her limit. There he paused with his hand on the lever, listening to her moans and watching her breasts rise and fall on her heaving ribs as she twisted from side to side the few millimeters the rack allowed.. He looked at her face, her eyes tightly closed and her mouth opened wide as she sucked in air. He waited for her to open her eyes and when she did she stared at him, uncomprehending at first, and then, with the realization he was her torturer, she arched her body against the ropes and gave one last pull with her arms trying to free her wrists before she collapsed back on the rack. She looked up at him, her eyes pools of despair, tears now running down her cheeks and her perfect white teeth worrying her lower lip. She saw his eyes move to his right and her eyes followed them to his hand still resting on the lever. She watched waiting for him to engage the gears the would stretch her further, that would bring new agony to her elbows and knees, armpits and belly until every fiber of her body was on fire and her only wish was for death.

But Chang's hand did not move and after long moments Megan cried out between sobs, "Do it! Do it! Oh God just do it…just get it over with…I can't stand this anymore…No! No! Don't…don't stretch me…have mercy oh God have mercy…mercy…please mercy…"

NINE: AN ADDED REFINEMENT TO MEGAN'S TORTURE

Chang did not answer but lifted his hand from the lever and disappeared from Megan's view behind the rack. When he reappeared he held a metal device in his hand. Megan stared at it with fear approaching panic, not knowing exactly what it was but knowing that it was to be used to torture her further. With her eyes fixed on the frightful instrument, she didn't notice Wie at her side until he had seized her jaw and squeezed it hard. She fought to keep her mouth closed but it was useless. Wei forced her mouth open and Chang inserted the retractor. Without pausing he began to ratchet open Megan's mouth, spreading it almost to the point of dislocating her jaw.

"Another element added to your helplessness. Now you cannot tell your secrets, or beg for mercy. And shortly you will not even be able to scream when we resume your torture. Wie, the nose plugs."

Megan threw her head from side to side and shrieked out indecipherable words of protest and dread as Wie squeezed the small rubber cylinders rubber so they would fit in her nostrils, then expand to fill them. Chang grabbed her head and held it steady to allow Wie to finish his job. Megan stopped shouting as her breathing was forced through her painfully stretched mouth.

"What now," she thought, "What's he going to do to me now?" Of course these thoughts did not take the form of lucid verbalized sentences. She was in too much pain, too terrified of whatever it was that would come next. The only words that ran through her brain were "OhGodOhGodOhGod…" in a constant litany for release from her agony. And beneath all that was the knowledge that - effectively gagged except for her screams, unable to speak, to confess, to give Chang what he wanted - there was no way for her to stop her torture.

Still she pulled with all her strength against the restraints that bound her to the rack. It was hopeless, but the pathetic writhing permitted by the ropes and shackles gave Megan the illusion of having some control of her fate. But even that illusion was taken from her as Chang slowly tightened the rack to the point that she gave up her futile struggles. She screamed the first time Chang moved the lever, but did not have the breath to scream again.

She was stretched taut. She could not move, not an inch. She gasped for air through the steel tubes that held her mouth gaping open. Her tight abdominals fluttered visibly from the strain. She felt every joint in her body ready to separate. Her soft breast were pulled flat over her heaving rib cage. Chang stopped stretching her and moved his expert hands over her body. He grunted with satisfaction. "She is ready Wie. Prepare her."

Megan felt the drops of water on her cheeks before the wet cloth covered her face. She had been water boarded in training but knew Chang had more in mind; they had far exceeded such a relatively mild ordeal, and had already simulated the sensation of drowning. Already breathing had become difficult as she inhaled a mist of water with her every gasp for air. The cloth was black, effectively blinding Megan, but she could hear.

"Do it slowly Wie. We want her to suffer as long as possible before she passes out."

Megan inhaled to scream but that sucked the cloth deeper into her mouth and made breathing even more difficult and screaming, impossible. That's when Wie tilted the flask and began to pour the water in a thin stream into the cloth above her mouth, slowly, as Chang had directed.

It took Megan only an instant to realize what was happening and how her new torture was to proceed. The weight of the water gradually dragged the cloth past her mouth into her throat, slowly strangling her. Racked taut, she couldn't move, couldn't even struggle. She had to lie there helplessly while her tormentors snickered and gloated above her prone body. She knew that they wouldn't let her die, that they would revive her to repeat the process over and over. That her fear would turn to pain and her pain to mindless agony as her body screamed for oxygen and drove all rational thought from her mind.

Five times they brought Megan to the edge of death and revived her for another round of the insidious torture. When Megan awoke after the fifth procedure Chang did not replace the cloth over her face. Instead he removed the retractor from her mouth and loosened the rack to the point it was at before her strangling torture. She was still stretched tight.

"Please," she moaned, "No more. Let me rest."

Chang did not respond, but instead said in a low voice, "Wie, the coals."

TEN: A TOUCH OF HOT IRON

Megan did not comprehend the command until she felt the heat from the brassier wash over her right side. She twisted her head but stretched as she was she could barely see the large iron bowl and its contents. But she could see the red glow from within the walls and the handles of the various implements protruding over the rim.

"Noooo," she wailed, "Nooooooo." Chang lifted one of the brands from the coals. It was a dime sized circle, hollow inside the rim with the exception of four spokes that joined in the center. He held it so Megan could see the iron glowing red, shimmering so brightly it seemed to advance and recede even though Chang held it motionless. She stared for a long moment at the brand which in a moment would be pressed into the flesh of her belly or breast or thigh and through her sobs managed to gasp "Wh…wh…where are yuh…you going…to tuh…tuh…touch me…"

Chang did not answer but moved the glowing iron down slowly, making it hover between and an inch above her nipples, letting the heat bathe her breasts but being careful not to allow the red hot metal to touch her skin. Megan writhed in her bonds trying to escape this new torment. She sucked in her chest and shook her head wildly from side to side, her voice rising and cracking as she begged Chang once again, "No. No. Don't oh God no. Don't burn me. Oh God please don't burn me. Not my breasts. Oh God don't burn my breasts."

The branding iron moved above her and for a moment the heat was far away, but only for a moment, before she felt it moving closer, this time at her side. She tried to slide herself away from the glowing iron but the ropes held her tightly. She was sobbing hysterically again, pleading with Chang to have mercy on her. She felt the heat creeping up her side, its intensity growing as it moved closer to its target. "I've told you…I've told... everything …oh God mercy mercy mercy please have mercy." Megan glistened with sweat, her nudity shining under the bright lights of the torture chamber. It seeped from every pore of her skin except at her right armpit where Chang held the red hot iron so close the sweat sizzled and evaporated immediately. She knew now where he would torture her, what part of her naked body would first feel the agony of the brand. Already the pain was unbearable but Chang held the iron steady, examining the short stubble deep in the hollow formed by her breast, side and shoulder. She was screaming now, screaming the same word over and over, "Mercy! Mercy! Mercy! Mercy!" Screaming and pulling desperately at the ropes that bound her by the wrists and ankles and spread her limbs taut; that held her naked and helpless ready for the torture.

ELEVEN: FROM THE FRYING PAN INTO THE (ELECTRIC) FIRE

Megan's agony was so complete she did not realize that Chang and the Koreans had left until the lights in the torture chamber were extinguished and she heard the heavy door close behind them. Her high pitched shrieks had filled the room from the moment Chang had pressed the hot iron into her armpit until he lifted it from her belly almost two hours later, but now the only sounds in the pitch black chamber were her pitiful moans and sobs.

Chang used the iron on Megan more than twenty times. He did not keep count, relying on his experience to tell him when his tortured prisoner had had enough. He worked carefully and methodically, moving the brand slowly closer to her bare skin before each touch, allowing the heat to build until it was searing her flesh and turning it an angry red, the pain intense as it hovered half an inch away but still nothing like it would be when he finally pressed the small red-hot circle against her thigh or her hip or her breast.

It was a seemingly endless cycle of horror for the tightly racked beauty. It started with the branding, the slow advance of the red hot iron while Megan begged and sobbed for mercy, writhing to the meager limit allowed by her bonds in a pathetic attempt to avoid the heat. Then came the touch, a moment of silence while Megan sucked in air and arched her back in agony and finally the ear-shattering scream of unmitigated pain. Chang then removed the brand and watched his prisoner writhe on the rack and listened to her incoherent ravings. Their eyes would meet and Megan would strain to lift her head a few inches from the table, the whole time begging him "No more. Stop. Please. No more. Please. I beg you. Please." Chang would let her go on as long as she could hold her head up, and when she was exhausted and finally let it fall back to the rack he would take a new iron from the brazier. There would be three or four or five touches before Megan passed out. Chang would casually smoke a cigarette and study his racked victim, or make lewd comments about her to his companions, drawing nervous laughs. If she didn't come around in ten minutes he would have Wie dash a bucket of cold water over her and when her eyes opened would lean close to her face and whisper "So Megan, are you ready to talk now or must I go on with the pain." Megan's only reply would be to beg him over and over to end her torture. To which Chang would walk over to the brazier and being stirring the coals with a brand. And so would start another cycle.

Megan had no idea how long she lay there in the darkness. She was aware of nothing other than the all-consuming pain that washed over her in waves. Her nudity, her shackled wrists and ankles, her spread-eagled limbs, her lithe body stretched taut and held motionless on the rack – all had become nothing more than the facts of her existence. But when she heard the door open and the lights flooded the room, she became acutely aware of all these things. Of being completely exposed and helpless and unable to move.

So she wept. Megan had sobbed and screamed in pain and in fear but now she wept in despair. When they freed her wrists and ankles from the shackles she didn't try to move. When they rolled her over onto her stomach and bound her wrists behind her she didn't resist. When she was thrown over the shoulder of one of the guards all she did was groan and continue to sob.

Megan was carried a short distance to a simple but odd looking device, a hollow cube of black rods. Running across the top at the rear was a narrow platform, from the middle of which rose a foot long metal tube with a tapered snout. Directly behind it was the "chairs" back, two parallel rods that rose three feet in the air and held a headrest that could slide up and down their length. The devise was festooned with straps and manufactured from the same material as the rack. Bent double over the shoulder of the guard, Megan saw nothing of this. In her present state even if she had it would have been unlikely that she would have deduced the seat was meant to hold her for electro-torture.

TWELVE: STRAPPED AND IMPALED IN THE TORTURE CHAIR

The three guards positioned her on the chair. Two held her underneath her thighs so she was suspended in air in a sitting position, while the one who had carried her from the rack pulled her bound wrists over the back of the construction so the poles and headrest were between her back and arms. Then they carefully lowered her so the metal tube entered her anus.

At the touch of the cold metal Megan grunted and stiffened, and as the tube slid into her bowels she began to twist in the grip of the guards. Her moans grew in volume and her writhing more desperate as she sank deeper onto the metal spear. The pain was manageable but as the tube filled her it awakened her to the fact she was being prepared for more torture.

She made a feeble attempt to rise from shaft that now impaled her but with her wrists bound behind her she had no balance and no leverage. The guards paid no attention to her struggles and began strapping her to frame. "Oh God, no. No. No." She was sobbing again, shaking her head slowly from side to side and repeating "No. No. No." over and over. Her wrists were fastened to the poles behind her and another strap drew her elbows closer and closer together until they touched, eliciting a cry of pain from Megan. "Stop. Oh God stop. No. Don't. Stop." A third strap just below the shoulder lashed her arms tightly to the poles leaving them immobile. Even before he was done binding her arms another of the guards was tightening narrow belts just below her breasts and around her waist, fixing her torso firmly to the back of the frame and tearing her insides against the thick metal spike. This time her cry of pain was a shrill scream.

They started binding Megan's legs at the thighs. The frame was wide enough so that when the straps which circled her thighs just inches below her sex were pulled tight her legs were spread wide, opening her completely. She stared down below her thin dusting of pubic hair; she could see the lips of her vagina. There was nothing else, just air, between them and Chang's instruments. She gave a short cry and strained to close her legs. Nothing, not a fraction of an inch. They had already bound her knees to the frame. "Not my pussy," she sobbed, "They're going to torture my pussy. Oh God not there, not there." All she could see was her exposed sex and the two Koreans strapping her ankles to the frame. She looked up at the third guard. It was Wie. "Please," she begged, "No more. I can't stand any more pain." Wie licked his lips. "Don't do this to me!"

"Lectric now," he said with a smile. "No. NO! Get Chang. I'll tell. I can't stand any more. I'll tell. I'll give him Susan. I'll talk. I'll tell him about Susan. Just no more torture." She was babbling now. "I'll tell him everything. No more torture. I'll talk. I can't stand it. I'll give him Susan. STOP TORTURING ME. OH GOD STOP! STOP! I'll TALK! JUST STOP TORTURING MEEEE!"

Whether Wie did not understand her she because she was screaming in English or simply ignored her, she would never know. For it was at that moment the thick rubber bit was shoved between her teeth and tied behind her head. They were almost done. Her head was pulled back and strapped to the headrest. Now they were finished. She was ready.

Wie reached down and touched her nipple. "Lectric now. Lectric here," he said. He pressed three fingers against the lips of her vagina. "Lectric here." He turned and walked out.

Megan could not move. She could not scream after him to stop, that she would talk. She could only weep. And wait.

THIRTEEN: MEGAN IS BROKEN, BUT HER TORTURE GOES ON

Chang appeared on her left side moments later wheeling a cart upon which was a gray metal box with a number of dials and switches and cables running from the top. He positioned it in front of her slightly to her right. With her head tightly strapped to the chair she could not turn an inch to either side but Chang made sure the device was set up within her field of vision.

Chang stood behind Megan and rubbed her bare shoulders. "There, there," he cooed, "It will be over soon. Another two or three hours and I will give you a chance to unburden yourself of this terrible information. Perhaps you are already willing. Who knows? But first I think I must make sure. And also make you pay a little more for your impossible arrogance. Yes, it does seem so long ago you were playing your little games with me. The gag is necessary so that in the throes of the electro-torture you don't bite down and break your teeth. But enough. Time to get you ready."

Megan could do nothing by sob through her gag. She tried to talk, to cry out to him that she would tell him everything, that this was all so unnecessary, that she couldn't stand any more pain, any more torture. All that escaped around the thick rubber slab was a pitiful gurgling moan.

Megan had never seen such an instrument before but she certainly knew its purpose. Chang had told her and even Wie had taunted her with electro-torture. She had no idea how electro-torture would feel, other than it would hurt her terribly. She could not even imagine what it would be like, as opposed to, say, the branding iron. The red hot metal pressed to her armpit was more horrible than she could have ever dreamt, but still before the brand ever touched her flesh she knew the quality of the pain, if not the intensity.

Chang was squatting in front of her, clipping one of the leads to her big toe on the right foot just behind the nail. The teeth of the clamp dug deeply into her flesh and Megan gave a short cry of pain behind her gag. He repeated the process on her left toe before he rose and stood over her. He was holding a long black rod made of the same material as the rack except for a needle thin metal point that extended two inches from the end. A wire ran from the wand to the gray metal box. Without moving his eyes from hers he reached behind him and pressed a plastic rocker switch on the box. There was a low hum and he smiled.

"I would tell you to prepare yourself but as you will momentarily discover that is impossible. I promise you no one who has not suffered under my particular brand of electro-torture can begin to comprehend the pain.."

Megan tried to beg by grunting into her gag and opening her eyes wide, hoping that he would understand how she was imploring him to end her ordeal. But Chang simply turned his head to the gray metal box and tripped the first in a row of toggle switches. A red light below the switch began to glow. When he turned back the tears were streaming down Megan's cheeks and her moans could be heard clearly behind the thick rubber bit forced between her teeth.

Chang centered himself between Megan's thighs. Her eyes first went up to his but quickly moved to the black rod he held in his right hand. He casually placed it on Megan's left knee and at the touch she jerked back the few millimeters her bonds would allow. There was no pain. He rested it at the bottom of her thigh for a moment and then slid it down the inside of her calf, the composite material smooth against her flesh. When he got to her ankle he turned the rod so the point of the long metal needle was now in contact with her skin. The point was narrow but rounded, not sharp. He slid it up the sole of her foot from the heel to the pad beneath her large toe.

Megan's stare was fixed on the rod. Her breasts rose and fell dramatically above the strap that held her fast against the back of the torture frame and strands of spittle bubbled through the thin space between her lips and the rubber wedge that gagged her. Chang lifted his thumb off the handle of the rod and she saw the notched wheel beneath it, saw his thumb come back down on the wheel and slowly rotate it forward.

The pain was immediate and astounding. And got worse. Chang moved the rod down Megan's sole, slowly turning the dial and increasing the voltage as he did. When he reached her heel it felt as though a thousand hot needles were being pushed deeper and deeper into her bare foot. Her lithe body went rigid, her once supple muscles now tense and vibrating as the electricity tore into her leg. Chang moved the wand up the outside of her calf and then over her knee to the inside of her thigh. Megan did not scream. She couldn't. The agony of the electro-torture was literally breath taking. It was as though an iron band had been tightened around her chest. She jerked and bucked under the straps that held her immobile to the torture chair, the only sound escaping her gagged mouth a short series of gasps that hissed around the rubber wedge. Behind her back below her bound wrists her hands clawed the air. Her eyes were open impossibly wide and as Chang moved the rod to within a few centimeters of her pussy they began to roll back in her head.

Chang lifted the rod and Megan desperately sucked in air around the wedge of gag. Her eyes were mere slits, the lids fluttering rapidly. Her bared breasts rose and fell with her short staccato breathing. Other than that there was no sign she was alive. Her muscles, moments before alive with spasms, were now flaccid. Her hands hung limply beneath her wrists fettered behind her back. If her head had not been strapped to the back of the torture chair it would have fallen forward on her chest.

Chang watched her intently for a full five minutes, then reached to a shelf below the electric generator and picked up a syringe. He jabbed it into Megan's neck, injected half the contents, and then stepped back to wait. Within a few seconds Megan stirred. Her face, which had paled to chalk white, began to flush. Her eyes opened but Chang noted that they stared vacantly ahead. He bent over and unhooked the lead from her big toe. Still she did not react. He slapped her cheek with his palm then pinched first her earlobe and then her left nipple, hard. Megan squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, and when they opened she stared directly at Chang. She tried to say something. He responded by closing the serrated jaws of the alligator clip on her nipple.

Megan bellowed in pain. Her nipple was crushed between the jaws of the clip, the tip of the pink bud visible where it protruded beyond the ugly teeth that pierced the delicate flesh. She was still crying when Chang brought a second clip toward her right nipple. She tried to shake her head but it was held fast to the chair. She begged for mercy, but the gag filled her mouth. There was nothing that could be done. She was helpless.

The pain slowly ebbed to a dull burning but Megan found no release from her torture. The pain was replaced by fear. If the mere closing of the clips on her tender nipples had caused her such agony, what would it be like when Chang started to course electricity through them?

At the moment Chang was not looking at Megan. He was fiddling with the dials and toggles on the generator. When he did turn to her he smiled and said only, "Ready?" Megan screamed into her gag and began to struggle madly against the straps that bound her to the torture chair. She would not be able to bear it, the thousand pin points of pain tearing at her nipples, the liquid fire eating at her soft breasts. She tried to beg, to promise, anything to prevent the electricity from savaging her once again. She was still struggling and crying into the rubber bit between her teeth when Chang once more started her torture.

Again he used the evil baton, sliding it in slow arcs up her left breast. The only sound in the torture chamber was the low insistent crackling of the electricity as it ran across her skin from the baton to the clamp fastened to her nipple, and her desperate screams muted by the gag. He worked as slowly as possible, savoring every movement of her naked body, restricted as it was by the straps, as she bucked and writhed in the torture chair.

Even the drug that had been injected into her neck couldn't keep Megan conscious for the full duration of her ordeal. Twice he had to use an ammonia capsule to bring her around so she could appreciate his technique with electro-torture. He turned up the current and prodded the tortured agent in her armpits and navel. He slid the baton up the ridge between her pulsating abdominal muscles, switching the anode from right to left nipple and back again, slowly increasing the current then shutting it down. Megan collapsed in the torture chair desperately sucking air in through her nose and around her gag until once again he hit the switch and the imprisoned girl was thrown against her bonds, straining against the straps until with an audible snap the leather that held her head to the chair gave way. Now Megan's head whipped from side to side and banged against the board behind her until finally with a long shrill howl her head fell forward onto her breasts. Chang now decided it was time to cease the punishment and retrieve the information his captive possessed. Well, almost time.

He waited fifteen minutes for the unconscious agent to come to. But although she moaned and cried out almost continually she remained nonresponsive to his occasional prodding. Finally he emptied the last of the hypodermic into her neck.

Almost immediately Megan's eyelids fluttered open. There was then that moment of uncertainty when dreams and oblivion merge into reality. Her vision cleared and she saw Chang standing before her. She looked down and stared at her tightly bound naked body, at her flesh raw and bleeding where the leather straps had cut into her during her frantic struggles; at the alabaster skin showing the angry red marks of her whipping, her branding and her electro-torture. She looked back up at Chang and now she remembered, comprehended; and she began to weep.

Megan's head feel forward once again and deep sobs racked her body. Why couldn't she just die? WHY COULDN'T SHE JUST DIE! Tears seeped from her tightly closed eyes and rolled down her cheeks, falling onto her heaving breasts. Could this go on forever? Could Chang torture her forever?

Chang's palm was on her belly, pushing, and she became aware of the metal pole inserted so deeply in her rectum. It hurt like hell but had been forgotten during the unbearable agony of the electro-torture. Now as her viscera were shoved against the unyielding spike she moaned in pain, then screamed in terror as Chang's fingers spread her labia and began to manipulate her clitoris between the serrated jaws of the alligator clip. He let the teeth barely scratch the surface of the tender bud while Megan shook her head violently from side to side screaming NO! NO! NO! over and over into her gag. He's going to do it! He's going to do it! shrieked incessantly inside Megan's brain. Despite all logic, despite all the horrors Chang had visited on her, somewhere deep in her heart she had believed that her pussy was inviolate. Perhaps because through all the inhuman torture he had never hurt her there forgotten was the taut wire between her legs; that was eons ago, a minor inconvenience that happened to a different person, a person yet to learn the true meaning of pain and torture or perhaps because she was willing to do his bidding, to do anything he demanded, the thought of vaginal torture had remained out of her thoughts forgotten was Wie's threat of "electric here."

Until now. Chang released the spring loaded clip and the jaws clamped shut on her clit. For a brief instant Megan froze, her body rigid, her breathing stilled. Then with an unholy shriek she began banging her head against the back of the chair three, four five times until she collapsed in her bonds, stunned and breathless.

Chang wasted no time trying to repair the head restraint. He simply motioned for Wie who quickly fastened a thick pad to the headboard. Now the tortured girl could smash her head backward all she wanted.

By the time Wie had finished his little chore Megan had recovered. She looked up to see Chang holding a small black metal box with a dial, two switches and two wires running down from the front. The wires ran between Megan's wide spread thighs. She moaned, her lips quivering around the obscene gag. She shook her head back and forth slowly, begging him silently not to do it, not to subject her to this final degradation. He didn't have to, he had won, she was his, she was broken, just don't, please, not this, not there?

Chang looked at her and spoke. "As you may have surmised, one of the wires runs to the clip fastened to your clit, the other to the pole lodged in your bowels." That's all he said. Then he turned the dial.

What Megan felt was beyond pain. Her stomach contracted into a tight knot and her belly exploded with fire. He held her there for five seconds and then turned off the juice. Megan's screams filled the room even with the gag firmly planted between her lips, but only between the applications of electric power that ran through her gut between her pussy and the stake violating her anus. When Chang turned the dial she couldn't breathe, no less scream.

Chang tortured Megan for another half hour. When he tired of using the spike as a conductor he fucked her with the electric baton. He tortured her breasts and belly again and then went back to using the circuit between her clit and her rectum. He savored the way she shook her head wildly when he approached her with the baton, the way she desperately struggled to free her wrists bound so tightly behind her back and the way those struggles made her bare shoulders shake and her arms pulled taut over the back of the chair quiver with the strain. He relished her incoherent pleadings for mercy as his hand paused over the dial of the rheostat and the agonized screams before the electricity drove the air from her lungs.

FOURTEEN: MEGAN IS REINTRODUCED TO SUSAN

Megan actually knew more about Susan than she was even willing to admit to herself under torture. But when Chang removed the gag from her mouth she told him everything she knew, everything, over and over interrupted only by her begging him not to torture her anymore, not to hurt her anymore.

Susan was actually her real name. Her parents had escaped to the South and finally to the U.S. where Susan was born. She was an American girl but spoke fluent Korean and in a story too long and involved to be told here, was implanted in Korea a little over a year before Megan's capture.

Megan was given drugs medical care and after just a few days had recovered to the point that she could walk albeit with pain and take a little solid food. She remembered very little of the details of her torture, but retained a vivid recollection of her fear. She remembered nothing of being strapped into the chair and the ensuing violation with electricity. She wondered if she would ever be released and if she were, would she ever see Susan again. She hoped, and believed the CIA had gotten her out of Korea.

Four days after her ordeal Megan was taken from the infirmary. She was wearing a blue prison smock and was bare footed. Her wrists were cuffed behind her back. She was forced to walk down a long corridor. Even with the needles removed, each step was painful to the extreme. An elevator took her down many floors. It open into a dark area, lit only by two powerful torches held by two Korean guards, one of whom shined it in her face. The hand cuffs were removed and she was ordered to strip off her smock, which she did. She was then pulled back into a large wooden chair, her wrists were shackled to the arms and her ankles to the legs. A wad of cloth was crammed into her mouth and fastened by a rope which was knotted at the base of her neck. The men left Megan there for hours naked, gagged and strapped in the chair.