African Adventure Ch. 02

There was some nervous muttering, but no hands were raised.

"You are now employees of Mr. Thompson. What does this mean? It means that you are free. You can leave if you want to. Anytime you want to. It means that you will be paid money. In return for this money you are required to have sex with men. You will work six hour days for three days. During those days you will spend an hour with six men. On your day off you will spend four hours at other work, mostly helping in the kitchens. What you do on your day off is up to you. If you want to have sex with other men on your own time, that's up to you. Your money is yours and will not be taken from you. The food and your rooms are part of your salary. You will not be charged for them. You will not be charged for the medical care you receive. You will be required to have a physical examination every eight days. We do not want you to get sick. The men are not allowed to beat you. If you are beaten, or threatened, then you must tell us. You will not have men in your rooms. We have rooms where you can work in another building. These rooms have cameras. If someone beats you, we will see it, and we will stop it."

Sara paused to catch her breath and to assess the mood in the room. Then she continued.

"There will be more instruction and training before you are allowed to begin working. Tonight you eat and sleep. Tomorrow you will select room leaders and a section leader who will speak for you. Enjoy your food and get a good rest. Thank you."

"And now we leave," Sara told Jyoti, "To give them an opportunity to discuss these developments away from authority."

"When do you next need me?" Jyoti asked.

"Right now, of course. We're not done," Sara said, "I've drawn up a hygiene plan for these women, but I'd like you to take a look at it. I'm going to need to set up some sort of counseling schedule. It will be good practice for the counselors and the history teams and, who knows, we might get some information we can use to prosecute people and put them out of business."

"You should talk to Mr. Thompson's mercenaries," Jyoti said scornfully.

"We already have," Sara replied, "Sonia interviewed Vidu and all the other men involved in the hiring process. We'll provide that information to authorities, though I doubt anything will come of it. Better to turn Vidu loose and let him crucify a few more pimps."

"What?"

"Nothing," Sara replied. Mentally she cursed herself for the lapse.

"Do you have any other questions or observations?"

"They are expected to have sex with six men every day?" Jyoti asked, "That seems cruel."

"Ask them," Sara replied, "A woman working in a slave brothel probably deals with twice to three times that number and they are expected to work every single night. And they get damn all pay for their efforts and probably get sick and pregnant to boot. Pregnancies they are forced to abort at considerable personal risk, too. What we're giving them is a much better deal than they are used to, while still being a fairly shitty way to treat people. If I was in their position I'd jump at the opportunity."

"What do you know about their situations?" scoffed Jyoti.

"Far more than you do, Doctor," Sara replied, "I've read your file. Your family is moderately wealthy, upper-middle class at least, and you've never been in the sort of situation they face."

"And you have?" Jyoti challenged.

"I have, Doctor, though that's none of your business at present. Now, let's go take a look at the hygiene plan and then you can go get some rest."

_________________________________________________________

Sonia was eating in the women's kitchen because Robert required them to take at least one meal a day there and breakfast was the meal closest to what she was used to eating. In the afternoon and at dinner she could avail herself of the Belizean cuisine that typically filled Robert's table. Vishaal Jyoti approached her.

"May I sit with you?"

"Of course, Doctor. Please, have a seat," Sonia replied.

"Thank you," Jyoti said as she set her tray down, "This certainly isn't what I pictured when I applied for this job."

"This is pretty plush," Sonia agreed, "But don't get used to it. When you start going into the bush things can get pretty grim. Some of the agencies have very Spartan set-ups. I scouted a few of them when we first got here, and things can get ugly. Is this about the sex workers?"

"It's ... it just seems so ... callous. How can he exploit women for sex?"

"The guards are going to have sex. Would you prefer he ask them to get their sex on the local market? If the troops did that then the 'women' would be starving girls trading sex for food. The girls and the troops would spread diseases around and when the girls got sick they'd die; there's no treatment available to them. If you don't think that's the case, go take a look outside the UN camp down the street. A can of food will buy you an afternoon with the girl or boy of your choice. Mr. Thompson feels pretty strongly about that. What we're going to do instead is offer these women a twelve month contract that will pay them a hundred times more than they would earn in their entire lives in working conditions that are, comparatively speaking, paradise. And when that contract is over they can go back to India and retire on what they've earned or they can go live elsewhere. And don't forget the training."

"To be sex slaves? What good will that do them?"

'You might be surprised,' Sonia thought. Aloud she replied, "No, real training. I know because I'm in charge of setting it up. Basic literacy and math to begin with. Philosophy and life skills to follow. In twelve months we're not going to train them for much more than basic menial work, but a remarkable number of women prefer that to opening their legs for every diseased dick with two coins to rub together."

Jyoti banged her fork down on the plate in frustration. "I hear what you are saying, but it is so very ... alien to me. The world shouldn't be like this."

Sonia picked up her glass of orange juice and lifted it in Jyoti's direction. "I'll drink to that. A better world."

Jyoti tapped her glass against Sonia's and they both drank.

"Stick around, Doctor, we're going to make some good things happen. It won't be entirely bad for those women; some of them will even enjoy the work."

"Surely you're joking," Jyoti protested.

"Oh, not all of them, not even most of them. But some of them. You just have to approach it from the right angle, Doctor."

"Please, call me Jyoti," she interrupted.

"That's fine, and I'm Sonia. Imagine, Jyoti, that you have come from a place where your highest aspiration is to have a husband who is kind, by which I mean he doesn't beat you too much, and to have healthy babies. Where you expect to be old by the time you are thirty and die, probably in childbirth or of disease, before you are forty. Every day is a struggle to find enough food and even shelter. Your family has too many girls, so you are sold to someone who brutalizes you and pimps you out. Now you know you will die even younger and will not be permitted to have children. Suddenly someone offers you a chance at a future. You will work in clean conditions, you will be protected, fed, clothed, housed, and given an education. And now you are something other than a mattress with a hole. Some of them will swear off sex forever, but some of them will enjoy it. They'll enjoy having men lust after them and they'll enjoy being able to express their sexual desires without being despised as unclean creatures."

"Now I know you're joking," Jyoti laughed nervously.

"What's your sex life like, Jyoti?" Sonia asked.

"What does that have to do with anything?" Jyoti demanded.

"You're unmarried at twenty-nine. In Indian terms that makes you an old maid. Granted, you're a professional, so that counts for something, but don't you feel pressured to get married and get on with the important business of being a woman?"

"You've been to India," Jyoti accused Sonia.

Sonia shook her head. "Not even to hire the medical staff. I did it all via the phone and computer. But I have read a few books on the subject we're talking about."

"India?"

"Sexual freedom. Take me, for example. I was threatened with rape and enslavement of a sort. Very traumatic. But the most traumatic part was that it was almost a wish fulfilled. From the onset of puberty I had been troubled by sexual urges that society said were very, very bad. When I was threatened I was almost ... excited, and that made me feel very, very guilty. I didn't fit into society's mold and when that happens, society tells you that it's your fault. Fortunately I got over that. I found a place where I could unrepentantly be myself. People I could be myself around."

Sonia took a sip of her orange juice.

"You don't fit the Indian mold, Jyoti. So that makes me wonder why you don't fit the mold. It also makes me wonder what you do for sexual release when having unmarried sex is still very much frowned upon."

"Are you a therapist?" Jyoti asked.

Sonia laughed. "Not at all, Jyoti, I'm a sex-slave."

Jyoti laughed at Sonia's apparent joke. "There are ways, Sonia. There are conferences abroad where a discreet woman can meet interesting men. There are devices for when those men are unavailable."

"And there are jobs in other countries, far from prying eyes," Sonia said knowingly.

Jyoti blushed. "Yes," she admitted, "There are. I'm not opposed to marriage, you understand. But ... in Indian society a woman wields a great deal of power in the home and nowhere else. I would be expected to subordinate my life and my career to that of my husband. I don't mind that, not at all. In fact, I crave that. But I'm afraid of it too. So many men will simply take that power and use it, or abuse it. I haven't met anyone I trust enough."

Sonia smiled and patted her hand. "I understand that completely. Keep looking, the man you can trust is out there somewhere."

"I hope so," Jyoti whispered.

______________________________________________________________

"We're down to twelve sex-workers," Sara reported, "Indira decided to go home yesterday, so I gave her the standard package and sent her home. The twelve we have left are probably keepers. I personally class three of them as professional prostitutes, seven of them as women accumulating their hope chests, and the other two are sexual adventurers like Sonia."

"You say that like it's a bad thing," Sonia pouted.

Ilse giggled and Sara simply stuck her tongue out at Sonia, which made Ilse giggle harder.

"Evaluate those two for inclusion in the household," Robert said, "It occurs to me that it would be useful to have some women like that around in case of guests."

"You should look at Jyoti as well," Sonia added.

"Doctor Vishaal?" Robert asked, "What does she have to do with this subject?"

"She's like me," Sonia declared, "When she finds someone she can trust and an environment she's comfortable in she's going to push her sexual activities to the limit. I don't know what those limits are but it might be fun to find out."

"Not right now, Sonia," Robert said firmly, "We have enough to do without you drumming up new women for me to sleep with. You barely get to sleep with me three times a week as it is. Do you really want another woman around?"

"Not really," Sonia admitted, "But I wasn't thinking of myself, I was being your devoted slave."

"Someone wants a beating," Ilse said sotto voice.

"Always," Sonia shot back.

"Silentuj," Sara said.

"Jes, sklavinego," the other two women replied.

"No time for that right now," Robert commented while his attention remained focused on the papers in front of him, "Smith and Gutierrez are going to be making an appearance tomorrow. I don't know, but I suspect they have some targets to discuss. Any bets on who?"

"Joseph Kibanga," Sonia said.

Sara nodded in agreement. "I've seen the reports and his area has the highest incidence rate and the worst severity of incidents."

"Only one of my teams has the stomach to interview people from that area on a regular basis," Sonia confirmed, "I have to be careful to cycle the victims from that area through several teams or the attrition rate goes way up."

"That's the spike in volunteers quitting we saw during the second month?" Robert asked.

"Yes, sir," Sonia replied.

"What's the morale like on your interview teams?" Robert asked.

"Low," Sonia admitted, "The details are pretty horrific and no one has any real hope that anything will happen to stop the violence."

"Maybe we can change that," Ilse said with a smile.

______________________________________________________________

"Kibanga," Smith said, "He's running a fairly small operation. The only reason he's covered under the amnesty is that his group is so violent and no one wanted the job of hunting him down. No one will miss him. How soon can you move?"

"We'll get the teams in place in the next two days and begin the psychological portion of the operation. We'll give the psych portion a week. That's long enough for anyone who's going to surrender to do so, and long enough for them to get over their alarm and let their guard down."

"How are your teams feeling?" Gutierrez asked.

"Hungry," Robert said, "I've been feeding them a solid diet of excerpts from the interviews, with video footage. My guys are professional killers and this kind of indiscriminate violence annoys them."

"Don't blow this, Mister Thompson," Smith said, "The aid agency portion of this operation is working far better than I thought it would. You've managed to get serious penetration on every major group operating in Congo and the information take is, frankly, excellent. We're even getting positive feedback from the aid groups and government agencies. If you make the rest of this work then some important people are going to be very happy."

"I'm just all motivated now," Robert commented dryly, "We'll do our job."

____________________________________________________________

Simon watched from the hide position as the men milled about in the village. They carried guns and wore uniforms, but they weren't soldiers. Joseph Kibanga and his men were nomadic barbarians. They would descend upon a small village, kill most of the inhabitants and spend a week or so raping and torturing the remaining inhabitants before moving on. There was no apparent reason for this violence, it appeared to simply be the way that Joseph and his men preferred to live. Simon and the rest of his team had recorded enough information to hang the bastard three times over, but Joseph knew he was untouchable under the current political situation. Simon allowed himself a brief moment of anticipatory exultation.

"One, break," he spoke quietly into the microphone, "All elements report, over."

"Two, ready, over."

"Three, ready, over."

"Four, ready, over."

"One, break. Execute, execute, execute."

The plan was simple and executed with the precision of a ballet. As the two snipers next to Simon began shooting anyone who looked alert, two of the teams moved in from one side of the village, their skirmish lines forming an open V. They added their silenced weapons to the attack and made a visible threat that Joseph's men responded to. Predictably, they ran pell-mell down the road away from the first two teams and into the raking machine-gun fire of the fourth team. A few minutes of house to house searching ensured that everyone was accounted for.

It took the team an hour to mount all the corpses on stakes and shoot the video footage they needed, but Simon didn't hear a word of complaint from his men. They had been watching video transcripts of interviews with Kibanga's victims for a month and there wasn't a single one of them that hadn't been dreaming of this moment.

_______________________________________________________________

The after-action review was held at a safe house in Kinshasa. The air-conditioning felt incredibly cold to Robert after months of living without and he was just paranoid enough to think they might have lowered the temperature to throw him off balance. As was the case with all after-action reviews, it focused on perceived failures.

"The psychological operations portion didn't produce a single result," Smith stated, "Frankly it's looking more and more like an unnecessary complication that will just come back and bite us in the ass. People will start to ask who is doing this and look for answers."

"I stand by it," Robert replied, "If we just went around killing people then people would assume the worst, that the government is involved. By portraying these as actions of a fictional vigilante group we give them someone other than the government to blame and we give the government a reason to scapegoat someone at a later date. It runs a certain risk, but it's a controlled and directed risk."

"I don't like it. It smacks of 'complicated'," Smith retorted.

"Then give me my pardon and let someone else do the job," Robert shrugged, "So long as I'm in charge of running the field operations, this is how it's going to be done."

"Let's move on," Gutierrez said, "How did your men do?"

"I think they did great," Robert said, "We sent them to the right location, they put the psych-op materials into place, they kept discrete contact with the target, they executed perfectly, and they walked out unobserved. You don't get better operations."

"You didn't use the helos to extract them. Why are you paying them money?" Smith asked.

"You know the answer to that, Dickless. I have them on contingency in case of an emergency. I don't want to ever have to use them," Robert responded.

It continued for hours until Smith and Gutierrez were both satisfied they had picked every nit there was.

"Really, I'm very satisfied with the way things went," Smith confessed, "Your team did a good job and got away clean. I'd like to see more field ops go that way. How soon before they're ready to go out again?"

"They'll go out as soon as you give us another target and we can prep the plan," Robert replied.

"The FDLR," Gutierrez said, "They're a thorn in the side of the Congo and Rwanda. We want them to cease any military actions in Congo. So you will identify potential targets and arrange to have them killed."

_______________________________________________________________

"Forces Democratiques de Libération du Rwanda," Sonia announced, "The group was formed around a core of the Hutu tribesmen that ran the 1994 genocide against the Tutsi. They offered armed assistance to the government of Congo during the civil war, which explains how they managed to set up bases here. Now that the war is done some of them have been raiding into Rwanda and others have gone the Kibanga route and become brigands. At one time they had more than twenty thousand personnel in Congo. Most of those, primarily the less offensive bastards, have been repatriated under the auspices of the UN. Those that remain are the ones that no one wants. They still number anywhere between two and three-thousand."

"May we kill them all?" Vidu asked.

There was scattered laughter in the room at the joke. The two kill teams and the native scouts attached to them were watching the images being projected onto the walls raptly. After they had absorbed all the information in the briefing and the briefing packets the mission planning would begin and would continue for several days until they had a course of action that allowed for an excellent chance of success.

"Only if they shoot first and you can't withdraw," Sonia snapped back, giving them the UN rules of engagement. This brought even more laughter.

"We have identified six targets based on available intelligence, including refugee interviews. We believe that killing these six men will stop the worst of the violence and encourage the other leaders to carefully consider their future actions," she continued.