A Long Time from Home Pt. 02 Ch. 01

Petra squealed in delight and then groaned, as I began thrusting in and out of her, enjoying the sight of her. With her eyes closed in pleasure, her hair splayed out beneath her and her tits bouncing with every thrust, she was truly a sight to behold.

This time, there was no teasing. I just fucked her as hard as fast as I could, the sound of our pleasure filling the garden gazebo.

"Fuck, I'm coming again!" Petra groaned and locked her ankles behind my back.

I just nodded, feeling my own orgasm coming nearer with each thrust into her drenched pussy. Passing the point of no return, I manage to groan "I'm coming!" as I lowered my head, kissing her.

Petra kissed me back eagerly as I erupted in her, sending her over the edge as well, and she groaned into my mouth as she exploded in an orgasm that made her trash against the sofa.

We stayed like that for a while, but the I lay down beside her, still panting.

"Wow." Said Petra with a smile. "That was good!"

I agreed with a nod. "Yes. So good, that I don't really know what to say right now."

"Than don't say anything." Petra chuckled and snuggled up to me. Automatically, I placed a hand on her back, caressing the sweaty skin. She purred with satisfaction, placed an arm over my chest and then we just lay there, listening to the sound of rain against the roof of the gazebo, while enjoying the feeling of satisfaction in our bodies.

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I must have dozed off because I was awakened by the feeling of a presence near us. Neither passive nor aggressive, it felt familiar, but animal-like. Laying completely still, I opened my eyes and looked in the direction of the presence. I must have slept for a while because the rain had stopped, it was dark outside and the automatic lights in the gazebo had switched on. Less than arm's length away a lay large black cat, observing me calmly.

For a moment, I was sure that it was a Black Leopard, also known as a Panther, but it had a studier build and a rounder, more robust looking, head. The legs were shorter and wider than a Leopard, marking it as a climber, not a sprinter, so it had to be a local variety.

It was a beautiful animal and I smiled slightly as I admired it.

I don't know why, but cats and especially large cats, loves Mentats and they're particularly fond of being in the presence of a meditating or sleeping Mentat, frequently purring if they were able to. Since this one wasn't purring, I assumed it could roar, as every cat I've ever encountered could either purr or roar, but not both.

Reaching out with my mind, I gently contacted it. As I had thought the cat wasn't trained or tame, but a wild animal that had felt me sleeping and wandered closer to relax.

In all the years, I have travelled from place to place, I have only been attacked by a cat once and that was by a tiger in Bharat (India) that had been too old and sick to hunt animals. This one clearly wasn't, and I didn't see the cat as a threat, but it was a problem, since the other people in the house weren't Mentats.

Animal minds are very easy manipulated, and the cat didn't even blink when I started to insert a few behaviour-regulating patterns, making sure that it didn't attack anybody and in general didn't perceive unarmed people as food or something to fight.

Carefully I slid down from the sofa and ended up sitting next to the panther.

"Come here, beauty!" I whispered, adding mental power to the two first words.

The cat crawled closer and then rolled over, so I could scratch it under the chin.

On the sofa, Petra stirred, causing the cat to roll back on its paws and I scratched it on the head directly between the ears, as it looked directly at her.

"Easy, Petra... it's not a threat." I said without turning my head.

"Are you crazy?" She whispered without moving. "It's a panther!"

"Yes, and it's beautiful." I turned my attention back to the panther. "Easy girl... Petra's no threat to you." I said soothingly and gestured in the direction of the rainforest just beyond the garden. "It's getting dark, and you need to hunt. Off you go. You can come back another time."

The cat looked at me again and then stretched and yawned, before it ambled to the garden wall, jumped over it and disappeared into the darkness.

Chuckling I stood up and stretched as well. It felt good as it always does after sleeping.

Next to me, Petra sat up in the sofa, shaking her head, as she looked at me and in a serious tone of voice said. "You're insane."

I shrugged my shoulders lightly. "Why? It's a beautiful creature and no threat to us."

Petra looked like she didn't know what to say, but before she could gather her thoughts, a dark-skinned woman came walking towards the gazebo from the house. As she came nearer, I recognized her as Halima Jobe, a former soldier from South Africa that Parker had bought three years ago.

Unlike Petra and the other women from Malaga, who was regular beauties, Halima was quite ordinary looking and after Parker had used the Loyalty Codex on her, she had become a member of his security force, like other women that came from a military background. Yet another thing I needed to look into.

Neither Petra or I had gotten around to get dressed, but if Halima Jobe had any reservations about watching naked people, she hid it well, as she just nodded to us and informed us that dinner was ready. I did feel a spike of lust emanating from her, but with Petra and I being close together, it was impossible to tell which one of us that have caused the feeling.

"Thank you, Miss Jobe. Let's go eat then." I said and dressed. "By the way... Could you gather the security force and the rest of the staff in the courtyard after dinner? I would like to say hello to them all."

"Certainly, Mr. Ivan."

Petra took the dress from the chair, but grimaced as she felt the wet dress against her skin. "Forget it... I'm taking a blanket instead."

"You'll look good anyway." I assured her with a smile and watched her warp a blanket around her body.

We walked through the open-air dining area, complete with a BBQ grill and a reading nook, and onto the large mosaic tiled patio with its huge swimming pool, relaxing sofas, and some hammocks. The patio was also one of the only places on the lower floor, where there was a view over the Caribbean Sea.

As we walked through the sliding patio doors connecting the patio with the living area and into the house from the garden, the beauty of it really struck me.

The light brown tiled floor, white walls and dark wood ceilings and woodwork contrasted each other beautifully and made a perfect frame for the wood-and-leather furniture, sitting on dark brown-and-white carpet. Colourful paintings, green plants and flowers added colours the rooms and as every common room in the house was two stories tall, supported by slim pillars, they were naturally cool, without being cold. Like anything else Parker had considered his own, the interior styling was dominated by natural materials and kept simple, yet elegant.

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After the dinner Petra, now dressed in a black t-shirt, camouflage pants and short boots, and I walked out in the courtyard, which was filled with people. From Parkers memories, I knew the estate employed no less than nineteen people: Eight security guards, a manager, two maids, two servers, two chefs, a gardener, a farrier and two farm hands. All the ordinary staff was locals.

Seeing the people waiting, I introduced myself, told them I was the new owner and that nothing major was going to change. They visibly relaxed at that and I guessed they had feared losing their cozy jobs. Then I used the trigger and mind trick on them, transferring their loyalty from Parker to me, which ensured their silence in case they saw something they shouldn't have seen.

One part of my work done, I dismissed everybody except the all-female security force and walked over to them. It was a varied bunch. Two dark South-Africans, two Chinese, two North-Koreans and two Europeans from France. None of them was particularly good looking, but as former military people, they knew how to do their jobs, for which they were reasonable paid.

"Hello again, Mr. Ivan." Said Halima with a smile, as I came nearer.

"Hello Halima." I looked at the rest, nodding as their faces and names fit together from Parkers files. "Kotu, Su-Yun, Li-Na, Rou, Shen, Colette and last, but not least, Brigitte."

"Good evening, sir." They said almost on chorus, looking surprised as I named them.

I fastened my eyes on Halima again. "As far as I understood from Petra, you're not allowed to date or have sex with anyone."

She looked like she had trouble controlling her facial expression as she said. "That is correct, sir."

"That is ridiculous... From now on, you can do that, providing it doesn't affect your job here." I looked at them. "In a moment I will ask how many of you want to go home if given the chance, but before you answer that, I want you to know, that this is not a permanent arrangement. If you stay with me, I will expect you to get an education in a field you're interested in and capable of doing. This might be security, but it could be anything, so think about it." They blinked in surprise, but didn't say anything, so I continued. "For the time being, you still cannot contact your family, but if you have friends or relatives in similar conditions, give me a heads-up and I'll do my best to have them brought here."

Their surprise turned into a stunned silence. I knew it was a lot of hope to give them after the treatment they had suffered, so I simply said. "It's not a final answer, but who wants to go home?"

The two French women raised their hands. Kotu and Rou did the same, while Halima Jobe, both the North Koreans and Shen Xia, one of the Chinese soldiers, just watched me. That wasn't a surprise, as they didn't have anything to return to that I was aware off. The two North Koreans had escaped the brutal regime in their home country by traveling to China, only to be captured and sold as sex slaves. Shen Xia had run away from a forced marriage and the same had Halima Jobe.

I nodded. "I will work on making that happen, but it will take some time. Please return to your jobs for now."

They nodded, turned as one in a true military fashion, and walked away.

When I turned around to walk back to the house, I discovered Petra standing four steps behind me, but instead of her usual smile, she looked serious, almost stern and her pose was that of a security guard at ease.

I chuckled as I switched to Ukrainian, Petra's native language. "Yes, my beautiful shadow?"

The stern face cracked in a radiant smile. "You keep surprising me. What was that about their relatives?"

Walking towards the house, I said. "In my experience, women in dangerous areas rarely travel alone. Groups are more secure and often consisting of friends or family. Unfortunately, this also means that some of those women might have been captured and sold in groups, but the individuals just didn't end up the same place."

"That makes sense. Hmmm, good thing you have money, coz that is going to be expensive."

I snorted. "Not really."

"What?"

Activating my memory, I found the information from the memory I had taken from Parker. "The price for a North Korean sex-slave is around a thousand American dollars, provided she's in her twenties. Cheaper if older and more expensive if younger. For Chinese or South-African women in the same age group, it's about twice that. European women are much more expensive."

It was strange, but despite slavery being outlawed everywhere, slaves were comparably cheaper than I remembered from any other age.

"And Ukrainian women?" Petra asked after a pause.

I stopped and looked at her. "You want to know what you're worth on the black market?"

"Yes."

"The five of you was a special order, aimed at getting the most skilled, beautiful, and well-shaped female soldiers that could possibly be found. For each of you, the price was two hundred and fifty thousand dollars or about ten times the normal rate."

To my amazement, Petra smiled a bit. "I guess, I should be flattered."

Smiling back, I nodded. "You actually should."

"What would you have paid for me?"

"Before or now that I know you?"

"Now of course."

"Your weight in gold." I said truthfully.

Laughing softly, she gave me a hug and a kiss. "You always seem to know exactly what to say." She gave me another kiss, but then stepped away. "I better go talk with Halima Jobe and the rest. Unless I'm mistaken, they don't know what to believe right now."

She was right about that, so I nodded. "Good idea."

"I'm full of them." She retorted with a dazzling smile and walked back towards the door.

I nodded to myself as I admired the shape of her ass until the door closed behind her. Besides her physical charms, Petra had an uncanny knack for knowing what ought to be done and the talent for actually doing it, which meant that she had been absolutely correct when she said she was full of good ideas. In my experience that was a rare ability and one I fully intended to take advantage off.

Upstairs in the main building was where the master suite was located and that featured a living room, an office style library, and the bedroom.

The location on the upper floor not only gave the master suite privacy, but also a fantastic view from the many windows and the French doors, that lead to the private balcony.

As all other rooms in the house, it had tiled floors, white walls, and a dark wooden ceiling, but the red-and-white drapes and the green plants gave the rooms colour and a stylish, yet homely feel.

Ignoring the bed, I walked out on the balcony and sat down in a chair to enjoy the view of the forest stretching out to the sea.

As so often before, my thoughts start to center on the mind-control Parker had invented and used on many of his people. Depending on the people used on, there were two basic versions: The gentle one, which mostly guaranteed that the person in question would remain loyal and work towards the goals Parker had set. This gentle version didn't require the victim to do anything that was against their nature and was the version that had been used on business- and security people.

The stronger version had been invented by Parker and Curtis together and was much worse. One of Parker and Curtis' goal had been to create a willing and obedient sex-partner, who was always ready for sex, but had just enough independence and personality to function on their own.

Powerful, but extremely crude, the attempts at making the perfect sex-slaves I had seen so far had more or less destroyed the personality and free will of the victim.

In Baylon such a person had been known as an Abdere (Baylon: 'Seized' or 'taken'), indicating a person that have had their personality taken away from them and making an Abdere had been considered murder, since that person could never be the same again, but only restored to a certain degree depending on the victim and the power used.

According to the information from Parker, only one out of four women had enough free will and personality to become the sex-slaves they had been trying to create, while even fewer of them had enough independence to become high-end escorts. However, as neither Curtis nor Parker could determine this beforehand, they had used the trial-and-error method, ruthlessly applied their mind-control, and then sorting them out afterwards. Those who whose personality didn't survive were installed in brothels.

As they had forty-two high-end escorts and had sold one hundred fifty-four sex-slaves, there could as many as a seven hundred Abderes in the various properties here in Costa Rica. Trying to restore these would take a lot of energy and time, and adding the children that Curtis had imported, just made it a whole lot worse.

The sex-slaves they had sold were a lost cause as they had been sold to very rich and influential men in the Middle East and Asia and there was no way I could get them back.

The escorts were another story. Since independence was a sign that the personality wasn't completely destroyed, the forty-two high-end escorts was those with the best chance of being restored. However, they were also among those hardest to reach, since they were spread over most of the globe, living mainly in big trading cities like Los Angeles, New York, Houston, Miami, London, Paris, Amsterdam, Seoul, Singapore, Hong Kong, Tokyo, and Shanghai.

Not only did they send some of their income back to Erebus, but they also worked as passive spies, passing on any interesting titbits they heard back to the leaders of Erebus, which in effect meant me.

The sound of soft steps on the floor interrupted my train of thoughts.

"What's up?" asked Petra as she laid her arms around me from behind. "You look so serious."

"Just thinking about all the cleaning up I have to do." I said and leaned my head back against her body. "Not exactly the funniest thoughts."

"Is it that bad? You haven't mentioned any cleaning up before, only that we needed to save some kids."

"There's a lot more. Parker tested and used his mind control on a lot of kidnapped women." I said with a sigh. "Take what was done with the two women in the warehouse in Malaga and imagine it being done to ninety women per year for eight years. Then you have it."

Parkers crude, but powerful mind-control had destroyed the brains off the two women in Malaga and they had been almost mindless in their desire to please Parker. The same fate could easily have happened to Petra and she stiffened up for a moment before she relaxed a bit. "That thought almost made me throw up. Can you heal them?"

"Some of them, perhaps." I said with a sigh and explained about the sex-slaves, brothels, and escorts as well as the connection between them. "For others, I can make their lives a bit better, but they'll never be normal."

Petra let go of my neck, walked around the chair, and sat down on my lap. "How can I help?"

"First of all, we need to rescue the kids. Unfortunately, they're not held by Parkers and Curtis' criminal organization, so I can't just have them released. That means that we have to liberate them by force and since they're being held in two different locations, we need to hit those locations at the same time. Otherwise, the network will move them to another location."

"That makes sense."

"Good, because I want you and whomever you chose to plan the rescue missions."

She looked surprised. "Why?"

"You're a trained soldier and I'm not." I said with a shrug. "The security guards look up to you and they got all the skills you need to do this."

Petra thought for a moment and then nodded. "Good point and the security force are trained soldiers like Delina, Esther and I, so we do have an attack force."

"Hmm what about Ayanna? I know Riya is a combat medic, but I have no idea about what Ayanna can, except she hasn't had any combat experience."

"She's Air Defense. Basically, she deals, or rather dealt, with military electronics." Explained Petra. "She'll be very useful when it comes to disable electronics, but not in real combat."

"Oh... So, we have the three of you and twenty-eight security guards."

"Twenty-eight? There's only eight here."

I shrugged. "Villa Bonita here is just one of Parkers estates in Costa Rica. He have, or rather had, another on the west side to be used when it is rainy season here. There're another ten security guards there. Curtis, Parker's companion, also had an estate on the pacific side with nine more guards."

"Damn, I had forgotten about him... Where do the guards come from?"

Activating my memory, I found the relevant piece of information. "Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Russia, Philippines, Germany, United Kingdom, Sweden, Romania, Kazakhstan and Ukraine."