Prince Mordecai: I am so sorry it took so long to get chapter 4 up; I was in the hospital for 3 months undergoing several strings of emergency detox procedures. Actually, I'm back here, but at least now they let me use my laptop. They tell me that after all I've done to myself, it's a miracle that I'm coherent enough to type.
Well, I shertainly showd tghem, dyd I nat?
And now, ladies and gentlemen (if there be any ladies or gentlemen among you), I ask you to join me on a trip to africa to meet more characters, including (eventually), Mr. Art Mawlind himself!
āPrince Mordecai.
Stephanie Derounian launched a lightning-fast kick at the wooden practice dummy in front of her. The puppetās head split down the middle, the smaller half falling on the coarse grass of her backyard. She ran her fingers through her long black hair; almost wishing she had an audience for her practice. But the tall grey picket fence surrounding the yard kept her neighborsā eyes off of her practice.
She suddenly launched a fury of punches and kicks that broke the dummyās arms and legs off at the joints and split the body in two.
This done, she walked over to the west edge of the yard, climbed up on the fence, and looked over the flat African savanna. There were some standard African animals just on the edge of the jungle in the distance. After gazing out at this vista for a minute, she turned and looked back at the town.
Robert Derounian, the millionaire philanthropist, as well as Stephanieās father, had built himself a brand new town out of 100 acres of African plains to house some of the Unfortunates Of The World that he had come over here to help. Most of them were political refugees from the Middle East. He had gone to live there, and taken Stephanie with him. It was certainly a fascinating place.
Richard, her 25-year-old brother, had come there too, but he was so wrapped up in his charity medical work that they hardly ever met.
Robert and Richard looked and acted almost exactly alike. They were kind-hearted wimps and suckers with youthful looks and male pattern baldness. They were both soft all over.
Stephanie, at 18, was very fit and beautiful. She had long, silky black hair and a mild suntan that she had gotten since moving here 2 years ago. Cute 'teardrop' breasts, 34C-22-34 measurements, large maroon eyes, and subtly rippling muscles rounded off a 5ā 8" frame. She knew she was attractive from the stares she received from some of the males in the shelters, and I guess she must have had some lapses of modesty because her tan, while slight, was completely uniform, with no tan lines. In fact, when Stephanie and her friend practiced outside, whether they were together or not, they never wore any clothes at all. Her father and brother were never home, and they made sure that no one watched over the fence. The purpose of this nudity was solely to eliminate the restriction of movement caused by clothing, not to tease anyone.
Not that anyone knew about this except her only friend down here, Lettie Derman. She had met Lettie when the Derman family had escaped from Afghanistan back in 2002 (10 years ago) and sought refuge with the mission. They were the same age, and both were crazy about martial arts. In personality, they were both proud, haughty, cold people who prided themselves on never giving in to their emotions. Honor and dignity were among the only things that mattered to them; if anyone ever found out about their nude practicing, they would both have died of embarrassment.
Neither of them wore any clothes while sparring with each other, but for the reasons described. In fact, they rarely practiced together anymore. The last time they had fought in the nude, they had succumbed to their emotions. But Iām saving that story for a flashback in a later chapter ;)
Today she knew her father was going to be home early, so she had kept her gi on. (A gi is like one of those white robes that karate students wear.)
"Stephanie?" her fatherās voice came suddenly, but not at all unexpectedly, from behind her. She spun around, smiling, and saw a visitor standing behind her father. He was a little gangly man with piercing eyes, dresses in a uniform that looked a little too fancy for a communist such as herself to appreciate. But beggars canāt be choosers, and she knew that she was probably going to have to be nice to this capitalist anyway.
This man grinned and her father gasped, and she looked down to see that her gi had come open and her firm breasts were exposed. She gasped and closed it quickly, but the gangly man was still grinning, and her father still looked flustered. She tried to change the subject with, "Father, who are these men?" and gesturing at the little man and the two similarly dressed henchman-types standing behind him, just past the sliding glass door to their house.
Robert stuttered, "Oh yes. Jin-ka, this is my daughter Stephanie." She moved to shake his hand, but he did not. He just looked at her, grinning like a maniac, as his friendlier-looking henchmen opened the sliding glass door and stepped out. "And this is Mr. Hollis," he pointed to the handsome blond who did shake her hand, "and Mr. Meerschaum." He gestured at the slightly mean-looking black-haired man who also shook her hand. "And now, gentlemen, make yourself comfy while Stephanie and I get ready for the party."
This took her by surprise. "What party?"
"Oh, didnāt I tell you? NIKO, another missionary group, is moving down here for a year or 2, weāre going to welcome them."
Stephanie frowned, puzzled. Her father had never āforgottenā to tell her this sort of thing before. Having some guys called NIKO down here was nothing especially new. It was just typical of the weirdoes he was always dragging down there to beg for money from. But heād never āforgottenā to tell her about it before.
She walked with him into her room, where he showed her an absurd evening dress that heād laid out on the bed. "Change into that. Your shoes are over there." He said gruffly and disappeared.
She did as she was told. The dress was a full-length, clingy, shiny garment that matched the color of her eyes perfectly. The spaghetti-strap top half left a full third of her breasts exposed. The bottom went down to her ankles, but it still clung pretty revealingly. The black high-heeled shoes, and her long hair spread down around her back completed the effect.
She was disgusted with how she looked. She was a martial artist, not some showpiece to impress her fatherās clients!
She left her home and walked over to the banquet hall.
As she walked up to the front of the building in the rapidly fading light, she saw the dim outlines of about 50 people standing in neat rows in the street. The dim light made it impossible to see any detail, but she thought she could see that they all had guns slung over their shoulders.
She frowned, looking at the figures which suddenly turned as one and marched in the opposite direction. As they changed angles, she saw the sun glint off a gold 4-bladed star surrounded by 6 dots sewn onto their backs. She was getting a little nervous. Was her father getting in over his head?
For a while now, he had been squeezing money out of a pretty tough crowd. Did he know what he was doing?
Robert, Richard, and Stephanie Derounian were all respected members of the communist party, and from what she had read, that star was a symbol of the NGMC in America.
These guys were worse than capitalists, they wereā¦ She didnāt even want to think the word.
