Citizen Kane Pt. 07

When the Red Army rolled into Berlin in the spring of 1945, no woman was safe. Russian rapists rampaged through the ruined German capital ravaging any female they could find between the ages of eight and 80.

Hundreds of thousands. The biggest mass rape in history. Wolfman Kane observed it all, wandering through mountains of rubble while the terrible Ivans rounded up their prey. During his time on Earth he had seen every conceivable atrocity but nothing on such a scale of human misery. Revenge was the word he heard uttered most by the conquerors. Revenge for what the Nazis had done across Europe.

Just a few months earlier, Barbie Boseman had slipped quietly away as Allied forces liberated Auschwitz. Barbie was a notorious concentration camp guard, a sadist who got her pleasure from torture. Heavily built, daughter of a shopkeeper, a slow smile that hid the true beast wiithin.

Nobody seemed to know how she came to be recruited to the SS or land her first job at Ravensbruck, but she came to Auschwitz with a reputation that even her fellow guards feared.

Barbie loved classical music. In her private quarters she played records to drown her victims' screams. One of her favorites was Tchaikovsky. Barbie would pick a man from a work party, the strongest and best looking of the ragged bunch.

He would be ushered in by two other female guards, stripped and bathed while Barbie watched. A half-starved captive who had not seen a woman for months, maybe years and who suddenly found himself immersed in their scents and intoxicating laughter. Yes, there would be food and wine and the women fondled him, kissed him, danced close with him and when he was relaxed and thoroughly aroused, Barbie would give the signal for her fun to begin.

She put a record of Tchaikovsky's Nutcracker Suite on the player and playfully flashed a bit of leg so that the prisoner could see her suspender belt. The guards moved swiftly in and pinned the prisoner down.

Barbie's Walther P38 sat snug in her shoulder holster. She also had a knife sheath but instead of a knife it contained a pair of nutcrackers. She was drenched in perfume. Even if he had wanted to, the captive could not have controlled himself. Barbie leaned her face towards him and he smelt the cigarettes on her breath. His erection throbbed. The guards had him trapped.

Barbie clamped his testicles in the steel jaws of the nutcracker. She squeezed with her full force and bent down to hear his nuts crack. First left, then right. Not so much a cracking sound as a pop, his balls collapsing to mush.

The last thing he saw before blacking out was Barbie's crimson mouth twisting into a huge smile.

It was the Red Army who liberated Auschwitz but by then Barbie was already in Berlin. And by the time the Russians got there she had used her contacts to get in touch with their secret police, the NKVD.

Wolfman Kane was tracking her movements. He wondered what ploy she would use to gain the confidence of NKVD Captain Vladimir Kobulov.

Kobulov leaned back in his chair and blew smoke at the ceiling. "Everything is fucked," he said. "The Americans, they think it all comes down to chocolate, stockings and smokes.

And you, dear Comrade Boseman, you say you can be of great use to us. So tell me how."

"I was in the camps," she said. "It will start to come out but most of the records have been destroyed and there are things..."

He waited: "Things? Things you have knowledge of? But how?"

She would not say. Only that she had been close to the camp commandant, secretarial job maybe, something that gave her access to the numbers. Yes, they could put her on trial but she was prepared to cooperate.

Kobulov tugged thoughtfully at his insignia, red shoulder patches with three silver stars. He knew she couldn't be trusted but then treachery and betrayal were second nature to every Russian so he had no great expectations.

He thought her attractive enough. She would probably look fresher without the heavy makeup but they were all tired and in need of camouflage

"Okay," he said. She smelt the vodka on his breath. "We will give it a try. I will have to explain you away by saying you have joined us as a collaborating German comrade to help with the new entertainments section."

When Barbie left the underground bunker, Kane followed her through the smoking ruins of Berlin. He felt no lust for her but was obeying an instinct he could not explain. The streets were crowded with crazed drunken soldiers but she could pass unhindered because of her NKVD credentials.

The women of Berlin were not so lucky. Soviet troops with bared chests lined them up and assaulted them. These were mainly men from the steppes, Mongolian in appearance with almond eyes and short crooked legs. They had thick arms. Many had tattoos. In previous lives they had been thieves and murderers.

A drunk soldier with long black hair lunged at Barbie but shrank back when she flashed her pass. "Well then, comrade," you can watch, he yelled. "Watch us fuck some Fritz cunts!" He brandished a bottle of vodka in one hand and with the other he held a naked young woman by the throat. There was a snap as he broke her neck. Then he ran her through with his bayonet.

Barbie hurried on, back to the small lodging house where she had found temporary shelter. She felt exhausted but was also happy to have got a foot in the Soviet camp. She had her own plans for the entertainments section.

In the street outside, Kane lit a cigarette. It was a habit he had picked up since his arrival on Earth. He listened to the sounds around him, shouts and screams, the ashes of defeat blowing through Berlin. A corpse lay propped in a doorway, corroded and crumbling away.

He remembered back, how long was it, 10,000 a million years, to other worlds. It was always the same. War and then more war.

But it did not have to be like that. It never had to be like that.

Kane wished he could hear birdsong and watch a flight of geese flapping across the evening sky. This planet. Such a beautiful place with so many wonders. His own homeland now a dusty wasteland.

It would come to that on Earth soon enough. Everything ending in fire, the forests burning and oceans boiling, all the great monuments of mankind turned to stone.

Kane sighed and went to join Captain Kobulov for a nightcap. The Russian was pleased to see him. "Comrade Kane," he said. "It's a black day when we can't find something to cheer us up." He pulled a bottle of vodka from his drawer and filled two glasses. They drank to the end of the war, the end of all wars.

"Do you know," Kobulov was saying, "the Motherland has lost 20 million in this war. Or was it 30 million? What the fuck. It's only numbers. See those raping shitbags out there? Worthy descendants of Genghis Khan. And how many died during the great Khan's conquests? Forty million, they say. Numbers, just numbers."

He refilled their glasses and they drank in silence. Kane could smell the captain's cancer although it would not become obvious and incurable for another year or so.

He said: "I hear you have a new supervisor for the entertainments section. What's she like?"

Kobulov's eyebrows twitched. How could the American have known that? He waved a hand in the air. "Oh, you know, a German spy trying to save her neck. But I don't really know yet. She hasn't started."

When Berlin was split into four administrative sectors, Kane had remained in the United States zone in the south. He wasn't American. He wasn't of any nationality. But he had American paperwork and it was the soft option.

Growing bored, he quickly signed up with the Werwolfs, a Black Ops unit tasked with undermining Soviet efforts to gain control of the whole city. That was when he met Captain Kobulov who had a shadowy intelligence role with the Soviets.

They got on, were warily appreciative of each other's talents.

Kobulov said: "Listen, Comrade Kane, this woman's name is Barbie Boseman. I'm not yet sure what she's up to but I think we will have some fun with her before it's finished."

They went out into the cool night where roving rape gangs still prowled. Kobulov shrugged: "Didn't Comrade Stalin himself say this wasn't a problem? Here you have soldiers who have marched thousands of kilometers through blood and fire and death and who could blame them if they wanted to have fun with a woman?"

Kane smiled to himself. That word again. Fun. It wasn't something you would normally associate with the Russians. A bleak nation born to suffering.. The gulags. Repression. Crime and punishment and everything in between. What is the matter with these people?, he thought.

As if reading his thoughts, the captain said: "You Americans, you know nothing. You have no history."

A woman stepped out of the shadows. She was bedraggled and unwashed. It was impossible to tell her age. She opened her dress to show her breasts, tattooed in German with the words: "I will do anything for cock."

Kane laughed. He spoke Russian to Kobulov: "After you, captain. Age before beauty." Kane's Russian was perfect if slightly archaic. He had learned it from listening to the aristocratic Leo Tolstoy.

The two men lit cigarettes. "Smoking is bad for your health," he said. "You should stop."

Kobulov looked puzzled: "What are you saying? Where did you hear that? It's nonsense. Smoking relaxes you."

"Never mind. Just something I read somewhere, I guess."

The following day Barbie Boseman arrived early at the disused cinema in the Soviet sector which was to be the headquarters of her entertainment troupe. She quickly arranged auditions for the chorus line. They were women snatched off the streets by soldiers. There was a selection process.

The new arrivals would be paraded naked. If they were attractive enough and showed some spirit they would be passed on for further processing. The rest would be sent to the brothels.

Barbie had the final say, a private show on the stage. A woman, given a new dress, bathed and made up, would perform with one of the brutes from the steppes. Barbie made those selections too, squat powerful men usually chosen for the size of their genitals.

The women wore a simple string of pearls and red high heels. They became known as Barbie's Pearlies. Officers could order the girl of their choice. Some preferred women with saggy tits, maybe because it reminded them of their mothers. There was no accounting for taste.

The rapist could follow a script or improvise. Sometimes he would reenact a brutal street scene. In other scenarios he would be seductive, soft lights and soothing words before tearing off the woman's clothes and having his sport.

A woman who had been raped more than 50 times would be given a few days off and special food to help her recover. No punching, biting or scratching were allowed. A girl would lose her attraction if she became marked.

No one knew Barbie as the Nutcracker of Auschwitz but she would quickly gain a reputation for putting on the best shows in town. Barbie's Circus. Attendance was by invitation and only officers were invited.

It was at one of these performances that Barbie had a new idea. Realizing that on-stage rapes could become routine, she mulled over some variations and asked a Red Army major for his opinion. "Listen," she whispered, "I have read that a man can ejaculate at the point of death, a sort of mechanical or chemical reaction of the body. What do you think?"

He smiled distantly. He was not really interested in her games but had been assigned to keep an eye on her while his bosses continued to debrief her about the camps.

"I have no idea," he said. "What were you thinking?"

She leaned closer, brushing a strand of blonde hair away from her face. "We will execute a few of these yokels to find out. After all, they are all rapists and murderers and surely Moscow must see that there has to be some sort of return to law and order here in Berlin."

That amused him. But it was true that the Kremlin was starting to think of a clampdown to stem the tide of anti-Soviet propaganda coming from the West.

"Very well," he said. "Send me a report and I'll kick it upstairs."

Of all the male performers in Barbie's troupe, Mo was her favorite. A squat powerful Kazakh farm boy. She called him Mo because of his vague resemblance to one of the Three Stooges, an American slapstick comedy team whose films were becoming popular. Mo's head was shaved. No smile ever lit his mean crooked features.

He was immensely strong from lifting sacks of wheat and cement. But it was his man pack she liked the most, swinging between his legs as he walked or pounded a woman from behind. Barbie called him her stud ram. She marked him for her experiment.

All men were expendable and in any case Mo was starting to think of himself as a cut above the other actors and there was no room in her troupe for big egos.

The major had no problem persuading his superiors that a show trial and execution would be good for Soviet discipline. It was billed as a special event and attracted a capacity audience.

A scaffold was erected on the stage. The chorus line performed a series of sex acts with male performers. A dank smell of wet army uniforms rose from the crowd.

They saw Mo led to the gallows. He was naked and his hands were tied behind his back. He had no idea of the fate that awaited him. In his dim mind it was all just part of the show.

Even as the noose was tightened around his neck. Even as the hangman punched him in the face for good measure. Even when the drum beat switched to a drum roll...the moron went to oblivion without really knowing it

Barbie was in a rare state of excitement. Her eyes shone and she chatted animatedly to the major whose stolid presence was starting to irritate her. He had a scar on his left cheek and thinning hair. His mind was somewhere else.

There was a huge roar from the audience as the trap door opened and Mo dropped with a heavy thud. His massive cock shot upwards and he ejected half a dozen powerful spurts of semen meters across the stage.

"My God," Barbie gasped. "Did you see that? It's true what they say. Terminal lust is what I call it. We are extending the boundaries of science here, major."

She was soaking inside her panties and girdle. She told the major: "We can do even better. We can hang three of these fuckers at the same time and take bets on who will shoot the longest."

The major leaned back and lit a cigarette. Yes, he thought, she was a weird one all right. He made a mental note to suggest she take a test or two. She was probably a psychopath and could therefore be dangerous.

Kane had watched the hanging of Mo. He had no human instincts so it left him largely unmoved. Later he chatted about it with Captain Kobulov.

They drank vodka and smoked. "Barbie is getting quite a reputation," the captain said. "She hasn't given us anything useful about the camps though. I'm wondering whether we should just get rid of her. There's no doubt she's a Nazi."

Kane agreed. He knew a lot about Barbie Boseman. He thought it would soon be time to send her to hell. "We are on the paths to glory," he said. "With your approval, I will take steps to make her disappear."

Kobulov nodded. He did not want to see any more executions. "Yes," he said. "But be discreet."

Kane had not had a woman for several days. Suddenly he developed a strange craving for Barbie. He wanted to weigh her heavy breasts in his hands while he looked into her steely blue eyes. She was asleep when he entered her bedroom. Silently he took off his clothes and folded them into a neat pile at the foot of the bed.

He flicked the sheet from her and sniffed her scent. When he plucked a few of her pubic hairs she stirred but did not wake up.

Kane got into bed beside her and stroked her thighs. His fingers probed her damp slit.

She sat up with a gasp and tried to reach for her pistol but he knocked it to the floor and held her in an iron grip. "I have seen you," she said. "Who are you?"

"I am an undesirable and you are desirable. I am from the Werwolfs. Perhaps you have heard of us."

He spoke German and entered her without further comment. She is tighter than I imagined, he thought. Still in her 30s maybe. Here, some longer strokes for the glory of the Fatherland. A fiery thrust or two for the Fuhrer's bitch. His hand strayed to the bedside table where he found her nutcrackers.

He noticed the swastika engraved on the wooden handles. Then the German eagle symbol tattooed on her right breast. His hand smothered her screams as he clamped her nipples. More pressure. Just like the crushing of nuts.

"Now, Fraulein Boseman, perhaps something more to remember me by."

He was looming over her and he dropped towards her face, forcing his balls into her mouth. They were too big for her so it was the left nut followed by the right.

"I believe you to be an expert on the scrotum," he said. "It is your pleasure to give pain. Such sensitive things, the testicles. Not delicate, but sensitive. A woman often neglects them when she is in thrall to the cock, but not you. I have heard you even have a purse made from a scrotum. Is it true?"

Her eyes bulged and she gagged. Felt his balls lurch and empty onto her face.

A light from the street flickered over them. It was done. His fangs gleamed and without a word he tore out her throat.

Several months later Wolfman Kane arrived in the Siberian sea port of Dudinka.

His reason for being there was obscure. An animal knows neither remorse nor hope nor despair. He was following a primitive call of the wild.

On the plains above the Arctic circle the cold was intense, minus 30. A stream of piss would freeze as it hit the ground.

Kane heard a distant rumbling. In his mind's eye he saw a mighty herd of buffalo thundering across the Great Plains. Saw elephants wallowing in a muddy river. Lions sleeping on the savannah.

Not far away he heard the howl of a tundra wolf and watched its grey shape melt into the pines. He made a burrow in the snow and for the first time in months, he drifted into a peaceful sleep.