# ASTRA PROGRAM — FULL CANDIDACY PHYSICAL EVALUATION

## Candidate File #6,417

**Name:** Lena Vasik

**Age:** 18

**Height:** 5'2"

**Weight:** 104 lbs

**Build:** Slim, petite

**Cup size:** B

**Sexual history:** Virgin (confirmed, mandatory prerequisite)

**Accompanying person:** Boyfriend — Daniil Orlov, 19

**Exam duration (scheduled):** 4 hours

**Pre-exam flag:** Candidate has accessed restricted forum threads describing exam protocols. Exam intensity elevated per Protocol 7-C.

---

## PART ONE — ARRIVAL

The corridor was seven hundred feet long and descended at a barely perceptible angle into the earth. The walls were matte-black composite, lit at ankle level by strips of pale blue light that pulsed every few seconds like a slow heartbeat. The air was cold — precisely 61°F, Lena would later learn, calibrated to keep skin taut and hypersensitive. She walked barefoot. They had taken her shoes, her clothes, everything, at the surface checkpoint, handing her a thin paper gown that ended above mid-thigh and tied only at the back of her neck. It was open down the entire back. The material was translucent under the blue light. She held the front against her chest with one hand and gripped Daniil's arm with the other.

Daniil walked beside her in his full clothes — jeans, thermal shirt, boots. The contrast was deliberate. Candidates were stripped; companions were not. The power asymmetry was part of the psychological architecture. Lena's bare feet made small sounds on the polished floor. Daniil's boots thudded.

"You're shaking," Daniil said quietly.

"I know."

*I read the posts. I read every single one. I know about the needles on the speculums. I know about the pepper enema. I know about the sigmoidoscope — four inches wide. I know about all of it and I'm still here because I want to go to space more than I've ever wanted anything. But knowing what's coming might be worse than not knowing. My body already wants to run.*

They had talked about it for weeks. She'd shown him the forum threads — anonymous posts from girls who'd completed the exam, their descriptions fragmented, sometimes incoherent, full of ellipses and abrupt endings. One post simply read: *"I finished. I bled for two days. I'm going to Mars."* That post had given Lena courage. Now, descending this corridor, the courage felt like a very thin shell over something enormous and dark.

At the surface checkpoint, while Lena was being processed — fingerprints, retinal scan, the buccal swab, the strip-down — a physician's assistant had pulled Daniil aside. Lena hadn't heard that conversation. She didn't know what had been said. But Daniil had come back looking different. Not scared. Something else. Something she couldn't quite read.

What had actually happened was this:

The PA, a calm woman with short gray hair, had said: "You're the boyfriend?"

"Yes."

"You've read the forum posts she found?"

"She showed me, yeah."

"Then you know this exam is painful. Extremely painful. What you may not know is that we've flagged her file. She accessed restricted preparatory material. Her exam will be modified — longer procedures, larger instruments, additional protocols she won't be expecting. The psychological component is critical. Candidates who know what's coming develop coping strategies. We need to defeat those strategies. That's where you come in."

"Me?"

"You'll be in the room. We find that the presence of an intimate partner amplifies both the embarrassment and the emotional vulnerability. But we'd like to go further. We'd like you to participate. Actively. You'd perform some of the procedures yourself, under physician direction. The emotional betrayal component — her boyfriend being the one causing the pain — is the most effective stress test we've developed."

Daniil had stood very still. Something had moved through him — something he recognized with a flush of heat and a twist of guilt. He'd imagined it before. Late at night, after she'd shown him the forum posts and described what would happen to her, he'd lain awake and imagined her in stirrups, her small body shaking, the speculums opening, the needles deploying, and he'd become so hard it ached. He'd hated himself for it. Then he'd imagined it again.

"I'll do it," he said, faster than he should have.

The PA had studied him. "Most boyfriends hesitate. You didn't."

"I—"

"It's fine. Better than fine. Candidates partnered with enthusiastic companions produce the most useful data. One more thing: anything you know about her — fears, insecurities, anything she's told you in private — share it with the physicians. It helps."

"Helps the exam?"

"Helps us understand her breaking points. Which helps us understand if she can survive eighteen months in a metal tube hurtling through a vacuum."

Daniil had nodded. His mouth was dry. He was already half-hard.

Now, walking beside her in the corridor, feeling her small cold hand gripping his arm, he carried all of that inside him like a lit fuse.

"Whatever happens," Lena said, "don't let me quit."

"I won't."

"Even if I beg."

"Even then."

*He sounds strange. His voice is different. Probably just nervous for me. He loves me. He's here because he loves me.*

The corridor ended at a heavy door — black metal, no handle, just a biometric pad. It read Lena's palm and slid open.

The room beyond was large. Much larger than she'd expected. The forum posts had described a "small clinical room." This was not that. It was roughly forty feet by thirty, with a ceiling that vanished into darkness above the reach of the surgical lights. The lights themselves were mounted on articulated arms — six of them — currently angled downward at the center of the room where the chair stood.

Not a chair. A *station*.

It was black metal and articulated composite, somewhere between a dentist's chair and a medieval device. It was reclined at roughly forty-five degrees. Lena's eyes moved over it and her stomach dropped.

Stirrups — but not simple stirrups. These were full-leg cradles, thigh to ankle, that would hold each leg separately, spread wide, bent at the knee. They had restraint points at the ankle, below the knee, above the knee, and at the upper thigh. Each restraint was a thick black cuff lined with something that looked like silicone — soft enough not to bruise, rigid enough to be absolutely immovable.

The seat had a large opening — a cutout that would leave her entire perineum, vagina, and anus completely exposed and accessible from below and behind. Beneath the cutout, mounted on a hydraulic arm, was a secondary platform bristling with instrument mounts.

The upper body section had shoulder restraints, bicep cuffs, forearm cuffs, and wrist cuffs. A chest strap. A strap across the forehead. A chin cup. Mounted on swing-arms at chest height were two flat plates — the mammography compression units, she realized, and her breath caught.

The whole apparatus could be rotated, tilted, and reconfigured. The candidate could be placed in any position — supine, prone, seated upright, inverted — without being unstrapped.

Around the station, on rolling carts and wall-mounted panels, were the instruments. Lena's eyes darted across them. She recognized some from the forum descriptions. Others she did not.

*Those speculums are bigger than the posts described. Those are — those can't all be for me. The biggest one is — no. That's not going inside me. That can't go inside a person.*

On a long steel tray, arranged in ascending order of size, lay five vaginal speculums. The smallest was a Collins Large — which, Lena knew from her research, was already bigger than what most gynecologists ever used. It had a wide, flat blade designed for maximum exposure. But it was the smallest one on the tray. The next was larger. The next, larger still. The fourth was enormous. The fifth — she looked away.

Each speculum had a feature the forum posts *had* described: mounted along the interior surfaces of the blades were thick needles. Not thin hypodermic needles. These were 14-gauge — each one nearly two millimeters in diameter, the size of a standard ear piercing needle. There were dozens on each speculum, arranged in rows. They were spring-loaded, retracted flush with the blade surface, designed to fire simultaneously on command, plunging into the vaginal walls while the speculum held them stretched open. Attached to each needle was a thin tube connected to a reservoir. They could inject.

*I knew about the needles. I read about them. Knowing doesn't help. Knowing makes it worse because I can picture it right now.*

On another tray: the sigmoidoscope. Rigid. Gleaming. Four inches in diameter and extended to an alarming length — longer than standard, she could tell, because she'd looked up the normal dimensions. This one was custom. The forum posts had mentioned four inches wide but hadn't described the length. This was easily twenty-four inches.

Beside it: the enema apparatus. A large reservoir — marked with liter graduations up to six — filled with a dark amber liquid. Even from eight feet away, Lena could smell it. Capsaicin. Hot pepper extract. The nozzle attached to the hose was enormous — four inches in diameter, bulbous, with a textured surface. It was not designed for comfort. It was designed to stretch the anus to full sigmoidoscope diameter before the sigmoidoscope itself was inserted.

*Five liters. The posts said five liters. That's more than a gallon. Of hot pepper solution. Inside me. Oh god.*

On a wall-mounted magnetic strip: needles. Rows and rows of needles in individual sterile packaging. She saw the gauges printed on them. 8-gauge — enormous, nearly the diameter of a pencil lead. 14-gauge. 18-gauge. 20-gauge. Dozens of each.

On another cart: a rotary tool that looked like a small dental instrument. Beside it, several heads — sanding discs of varying grits. Beside those, packets of sterile gauze, already stained faintly amber from some solution.

*The sanding. Oh no. The posts mentioned something about "surface preparation" but they didn't describe — they didn't say —*

There were four people in the room already. Three men, one woman. All in dark gray surgical scrubs. All gloved — double-gloved, black nitrile over blue. All masked, though the masks were the transparent kind that showed the full face. All watching her.

A fifth person — the nurse — stood near the instrument carts. Female, young, also in dark gray. She held a tablet and was already entering data.

"Candidate Vasik," said the tallest of the physicians. He did not smile. None of them smiled. "I'm Dr. Okafor. These are Dr. Brenn, Dr. Manova, and Dr. Yuen. Nurse Petric will be assisting. You've been briefed on the general structure of the evaluation?"

"Yes." Her voice was very small.

"You've signed the consent documentation?"

"Yes."

"The consent is comprehensive and irrevocable for the duration of the exam. You may not withdraw consent once we begin. You may scream, cry, and protest — most candidates do — but the exam will not stop. If you verbally refuse a procedure, it will be performed anyway. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"If at any point you lose consciousness, we will revive you and continue. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

*I'm going to throw up. No. Breathe. You knew all of this. You signed the forms. You want to go to space. Mars. The red sky. The thin pink sunrise. You want it. Hold on to that.*

"Good. Now — we understand you've accessed restricted forum material describing previous candidates' experiences."

Lena went pale. "I — I didn't know it was restricted, I just found—"

"It doesn't matter how. What matters is that you came in with expectations. Coping strategies. Mental preparation based on specific anticipated procedures and sequences. Our job is to evaluate your genuine stress response, not your rehearsed one. So your exam has been modified. Procedures you read about will be performed differently than described. Additional procedures you did *not* read about have been added. The sequence has been rearranged. Nothing you prepared for will happen the way you prepared for it. Do you understand?"

"...Yes."

"Also — and this is new as of your arrival — your boyfriend has agreed to participate in the examination as a procedural assistant. He'll be performing a number of the procedures himself."

Lena turned to Daniil. "What?"

Daniil looked at her. His face was flushed. She'd seen that flush before — in bed, when they were close to going further than they'd gone, when his breathing changed and his hands tightened. Her stomach folded.

"They asked me," he said. "I said yes. I thought — it would be easier if it was someone you trust."

"Daniil—"

"Lena, there's something I need to tell you before we start." He swallowed. "When you showed me the forum posts, and I imagined what they'd do to you — I... it turned me on. A lot. I couldn't stop thinking about it. About you, in the stirrups, with the needles and the — all of it. I've been aroused thinking about it every night since you showed me."

The room was silent except for the low hum of the equipment.

*No. No, that's not — he loves me. He's here because he loves me. But his face — oh god, he means it. He's been fantasizing about me being hurt. Every night. While I was lying next to him terrified.*

"I'm sorry," Daniil said, and he meant it — partially. "But I'm not going to pretend. The doctors said honesty helps. And I want to help you get through this."

"By hurting me?"

"By being here. All of it."

Dr. Okafor said, flatly: "Mr. Orlov has also provided us with personal information about you that will be useful in structuring the psychological component of the exam. Your fears. Your insecurities. Details about your body that you've shared with him privately."

Lena stared at Daniil. She felt naked in a way that had nothing to do with the paper gown.

"You told them—"

"They asked what you're most self-conscious about. I told them about your — about how sensitive you are. How you said you can barely handle a tampon. How you've never been able to insert more than one finger. How you cried the one time we tried—" He stopped. "I told them everything."

*He told them about the time we tried and I cried. He told them I can barely take a tampon. He told them, and now four doctors and a nurse know the most intimate, embarrassing thing about my body and they're going to use it. And he's aroused. I can see it. I can see the outline in his jeans.*

"Let's begin," said Dr. Okafor. "Candidate, remove the gown."

---

## PART TWO — EXPOSURE AND RESTRAINT

Lena's hands shook so badly she couldn't untie the single tie at the back of her neck. Nurse Petric stepped forward and pulled it loose. The gown fell.

She stood naked under six surgical lights in front of six people — four doctors, a nurse, and her boyfriend. Her arms moved instinctively to cover herself. Her left arm crossed over her breasts; her right hand cupped between her legs.

"Arms at your sides," said Dr. Manova — the female physician — in a tone that was not unkind but was absolutely non-negotiable.

Lena forced her arms down. Tears were already forming but had not yet fallen.

She was very small. Five foot two, a hundred and four pounds. Her frame was narrow — slim shoulders, a slight waist, hips that were just beginning to develop the subtle flare of adulthood. Her skin was pale — northern European pale, the kind that showed every flush, every mark, every vein. Under the surgical lights it was almost luminous. Every imperfection was visible. A small mole below her left breast. The faint blue trace of veins across her chest. The tiny pale hairs on her forearms and thighs.

Her breasts were small but distinctly present — B-cups that sat high on her chest with the firmness of youth. They were slightly conical, with a gentle upward tilt. Her nipples were pink-brown, small-diameter but prominent — they had hardened immediately in the cold air, standing out from the smooth plane of her areolae in a way that felt, to Lena, like the worst kind of betrayal. As if her body were presenting itself.

Her stomach was flat, almost concave. Her navel was a small vertical slit. Below it, a very slight softness before the gentle mound of her pubis — they had instructed her to arrive fully shaved, and she was, and the bare skin made her feel more naked than naked, every fold and contour visible.

Between her legs — which she was clenching together involuntarily — the outer labia were neat, thin, closed. She was small everywhere. Compact. Tight. Everything the doctors would be opening was, at this moment, closed.

"Candidate, step onto the platform and sit back into the station," said Dr. Okafor.

The station's surface was cold. Lena hissed as her bare skin touched it. She sat on the edge, then leaned back against the inclined surface. Her legs hung over the edge, pressed together.

"Legs into the cradles."

She lifted her right leg, then her left, placing them into the leg cradles. The cradles were shaped to receive the leg from mid-thigh to ankle, and they were cold too — polished composite, smooth and unyielding. The moment her legs were in them, the cradles began to move, driven by quiet servos. They spread apart, slowly, carrying her legs with them.

"Wait—"

They didn't wait. The cradles moved outward and up, spreading her thighs wide, bending her knees, drawing her feet up and back until her legs were in a position far more extreme than any gynecological stirrup she'd imagined. Her thighs were almost flat, spread nearly 180 degrees, her knees bent at right angles, her feet pulled back to hip level. She was opened completely. Everything between her legs — her labia, the tight crease of her vaginal opening, the small button of her clitoris under its hood, the smooth perineum, the tight pink pucker of her anus — was fully exposed, directly under the brightest surgical light.

*Everyone can see everything. Every part of me. The four doctors and the nurse and Daniil. All of them are looking between my legs right now. I'm more exposed than I've ever been in my life and the exam hasn't even started.*

Nurse Petric began fastening the restraints. Ankles first — the black cuffs closed with a heavy, definitive *click*, one after another. Below the knee. Above the knee. Upper thigh. Each cuff tightened until it was flush against her skin, completely immobilizing the limb segment it held. Lena tested each one as it closed, pulling against it, finding absolutely no give.

Then the upper body. Wrists — pulled out to the sides and down, cuffed to extensions on the chair arms so her hands were away from her body, unable to reach anything. Forearms. Biceps. The chest strap — a wide band across her upper chest, just above her breasts, pulling her shoulders back against the station's surface. The shoulder cuffs. A waist strap, tight.

The forehead strap — Nurse Petric tilted Lena's head back against the headrest and secured a padded band across her forehead. The chin cup rose from below to hold her jaw.

Lena was utterly immobilized. She could move nothing except her fingers, her toes, and her eyes. Every major joint was locked. Her body was fixed in position — legs spread wide, torso reclined, arms out, head back. She could see down the length of her own body — her small breasts rising and falling rapidly with her breathing, her flat stomach, and beyond that, framed by her spread thighs, the exposed vulnerability of everything the exam would focus on.

She tested all the restraints at once, a full-body pull, a surge of desperate strength. Nothing moved. Not a millimeter.

"Good," said Dr. Okafor. "Station integrity confirmed. Let's discuss the schedule."

He pulled a screen into view — angled so Lena could see it too.

"Candidate Vasik, your exam will proceed as follows. I'll give you the overview; the specifics will unfold as we go. Four hours. We will examine and test your breasts and nipples, your vaginal canal, your cervix, your uterus, your clitoris, your urethra, your anus, and your rectum. Each area will be subjected to multiple procedures including but not limited to: direct measurement with gauge needles, injection of diagnostic and provocative agents, mechanical dilation, speculum examination, instrumental probing, and tissue sensitivity assessment. Your pain response, vocal response, cardiovascular response, and psychological response will be monitored and recorded throughout."

He paused.

"Additionally, because you accessed the forum material, several procedures have been added that are not part of the standard exam. You will not be told which ones are standard and which are additions. And the sequence has been restructured. You told Mr. Orlov that you prepared yourself for the 'worst part first' — the enema. So the enema will not be first."

*He knows. Daniil told him my strategy. I was going to get through the enema first and then tell myself the worst was over. Now I can't. Now I don't know when it's coming. I don't know what's first.*

"Mr. Orlov, come here."

Daniil walked to the side of the station. He looked down at Lena — her small naked body, strapped open, everything exposed. She saw his eyes travel over her. She saw his throat move as he swallowed. She saw, clearly, the erection pressing against the front of his jeans.

*He's hard. He's looking at me strapped down and terrified and he's hard. And he's not even trying to hide it.*

"You'll be assisting throughout," Dr. Okafor told Daniil. "We'll show you each procedure and then you'll perform it. For many of these, you'll be the primary operator. We want her watching your hands. Understood?"

"Understood," Daniil said. His voice was hoarse.

Dr. Brenn — a stocky man with careful hands — had been arranging instruments on a rolling tray. He wheeled it to the side of the station near Lena's head so she could see everything on it. This, she realized, was deliberate. She would see every instrument before it was used on her.

"We'll begin," said Dr. Okafor, "with the anus."

*No. Not — not first. I wasn't ready for that first. The posts said they started with the breast exam. I prepared for the breast exam first. I was going to — no—*

"The standard protocol begins with anal tightening injections, followed by the enema, followed by the sigmoidoscopy. Your modified protocol begins with the tightening injections, then the surface preparation — the sanding — then the enema, then the sigmoidoscopy. The sanding is not part of the standard exam. It was added for you."

---

## PART THREE — ANAL TIGHTENING INJECTIONS

"Mr. Orlov, glove up."

Nurse Petric handed Daniil a pair of black nitrile gloves. He pulled them on. His hands were steady. Lena watched his fingers snap the glove material into place and thought of all the times those hands had touched her gently — her face, her hair, the small of her back.

Dr. Yuen — a slender man with a precise, quiet manner — prepared the injection tray. He laid out eight syringes, each filled with a clear solution. The needles attached were 20-gauge — not the thickest Lena had seen on the instrument carts, but long. Two inches.

"The tightening agent," Dr. Yuen explained, speaking to Daniil as much as to Lena, "is a synthetic astringent compound that causes rapid contraction of the smooth muscle tissue and tightening of the mucosal lining. The effect is temporary — approximately four hours — but intense. It will make her anus significantly tighter and more resistant to dilation, which will make every subsequent anal procedure substantially more painful."

"Why?" Lena whispered.

"Because the space program requires candidates who can endure sustained, escalating pain without psychological collapse," Dr. Yuen said. "Making the anus tighter before inserting oversized instruments increases the pain of insertion by approximately three hundred percent. This gives us better data."

"Also," Dr. Okafor added, looking at Daniil, "it means that when you insert the enema nozzle and the sigmoidoscope into her later, her body will be fighting much harder against the entry. You'll feel the resistance. You'll need to push through it."

Daniil nodded. His breathing had changed. Lena could hear it — slightly faster, slightly deeper.

"I'm going to show you the injection technique," Dr. Yuen said to Daniil. "Then you'll do the remaining seven."

Dr. Yuen positioned himself between Lena's spread legs, on a low stool that placed his face level with her pelvis. The surgical light was adjusted — brightened, focused tightly on her anus. Under the light, every detail was starkly visible: the tight radiating folds, the pinkish-brown pigmentation, the tiny involuntary contractions as her sphincter clenched and relaxed with her rapid breathing.

"Candidate, you'll feel a sharp sting followed by a burning sensation as the agent takes effect."

He took the first syringe and placed the tip of the needle against the ring of muscle at the twelve o'clock position — the uppermost point of her anus. Lena felt the cold point of metal touching the most sensitive skin on her body. She clenched involuntarily. Every restrained muscle in her legs tried to close her thighs. Nothing moved.

Dr. Yuen pushed the needle in.

Two inches of 20-gauge steel slid through the external sphincter muscle at a shallow angle, the point burying itself in the dense ring of tissue. Lena screamed — a sharp, high sound that bounced off the hard walls of the room. The pain was a bright, focused burn, like a wasp sting magnified and placed in the most intimate, nerve-dense area of her body.

Then he depressed the plunger.

The tightening agent entered the muscle. It felt like liquid fire — a chemical heat that spread outward from the injection point, accompanied by an immediate, vicious tightening. Lena could feel her anus clenching, involuntarily, harder than she'd ever clenched it, the muscle contracting around the needle that was still embedded in it.

"Good," said Dr. Yuen, withdrawing the needle. A tiny bead of blood welled at the puncture site. "Mr. Orlov, you see the technique? Shallow angle, two centimeters deep, slow plunger depression. Place them evenly around the circumference. You have seven to do."

Daniil took the second syringe. He moved between Lena's legs, into the space Dr. Yuen had vacated. He sat on the stool. Her anus was directly in front of him, inches from his face — already beginning to tighten from the first injection, the tissues visibly contracting, the tiny puncture wound seeping.

He looked up the length of her body at her face. Her eyes were wide, wet, fixed on him.

"Daniil," she said. "Please."

"You want to go to space," he said. And he placed the needle against her anus at the two o'clock position and pushed it in.

Her scream was louder this time — rawer. The tightening agent from the first injection had already made the tissues more sensitive, the muscle tighter, so the needle had to push through more resistance. He felt it — the dense squeeze of her sphincter against the shaft of the needle, the pop as the point penetrated through the tightest band.

*He's inside me. His needle is inside my anus. My boyfriend is injecting something into my anus that will make everything hurt more and he's HARD, I can see the outline of him from here, he's harder than I've ever seen him and he's pushing a needle into me and it BURNS—*

Daniil depressed the plunger slowly, watching the muscle react — the visible tightening, the contraction that rippled through the ring of tissue. A sound came out of him — quiet, involuntary. Almost a groan.

"Beautiful," he murmured, and then seemed to catch himself.

"Don't censor yourself," Dr. Okafor said. "Your authentic responses are part of the psychological evaluation."

"It's... god, it's incredible," Daniil said. He withdrew the needle. The second puncture welled with blood, joining the first. "The way it tightens around the needle when you push the drug in. I can feel it squeezing. And she—" He looked at Lena's face, at the tears tracking down her temples into her hair, at the way the forehead strap held her head so she couldn't turn away. "She's so beautiful when she's in pain."

"Five more," said Dr. Yuen. "Take your time. Make sure she feels each one distinctly."

Daniil waited. Ten seconds. Twenty. Long enough for the burning to begin to fade, long enough for Lena to start to catch her breath — and then he placed the third needle at the four o'clock position and drove it in.

The third injection produced a sob. The fourth, a broken cry and a full-body convulsion against the restraints that moved nothing. By the fifth, Lena's anus was so tight and so swollen with the astringent compound that Daniil had to push the needle significantly harder to penetrate the muscle, and when he did, the resistance and the sudden give produced a sensation in his hand that he would later describe to the doctors as "addictive."

"She's told me," Daniil said conversationally, positioning the sixth needle, "that she's always been terrified of anything going near her anus. She's never let me touch her there. She flinches if I even get close."

"Noted," said Dr. Okafor. "That information is useful for the later rectal procedures."

The sixth injection went in. Lena's scream had degraded into a continuous low moan, punctuated by sharp gasps when the plunger depressed and the chemical burn hit.

"She also told me once," Daniil continued, his voice slightly unsteady with arousal, "that she's terrified of losing control of her body. Of not being able to clench, or hold things in. She had an accident once when she was younger — she told me about it crying, it was her most embarrassing memory. She's going to hate the enema."

"That's excellent," said Dr. Brenn, who had been observing and taking notes. "We'll make sure the enema protocol accounts for that."

The seventh injection. The eighth. Each one harder to push in than the last as the cumulative tightening effect compounded. By the time Daniil withdrew the eighth needle, Lena's anus had transformed — no longer a soft, relaxed opening but a clenched, rigid, almost sealed ring of muscle, visibly swollen, dotted with eight tiny blood-seeping puncture wounds, the tissues flushed dark pink from the chemical irritation.

"Excellent work," said Dr. Yuen, examining the result. He pressed a gloved fingertip against the center of Lena's anus. It didn't yield at all. "Maximal tightening achieved. This is going to resist the nozzle and the sigmoidoscope very effectively. The pain of dilation will be extreme."

Lena was crying steadily now, tears running freely, her chest heaving against the restraint strap. Her anus burned — a deep, throbbing, chemical fire that pulsed with her heartbeat.

*Eight needles. My anus has eight needle holes in it and it's so tight it hurts just sitting here. And that was just the first part. The sanding hasn't happened yet. The enema hasn't happened yet. The sigmoidoscope hasn't happened yet. And none of the vaginal procedures. None of the breast procedures. None of the—*

She closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids, she saw Mars. The rust-colored plains. The vast sky. The thin, cold light.

*I want to go to space.*

---

## PART FOUR — ANAL SURFACE PREPARATION (SANDING)

"This next procedure," said Dr. Brenn, picking up the rotary tool, "was added specifically for candidates who accessed the forum material. It's not described anywhere in the posts you read. It involves the complete removal of the epithelial surface of the anus — the skin, all layers, inside and outside the sphincter — using a medical-grade abrasive tool."

He attached a sanding disc — fine grit, but not too fine. The disc was roughly the diameter of a quarter.

"The purpose is twofold. First, it exposes the raw dermal tissue, which is dramatically more sensitive to all subsequent stimuli — the enema solution, mechanical dilation, instrument insertion. Second, the pain of the sanding itself is a useful data point. It's a slow, building pain — not the sharp burst of a needle but a continuous, escalating abrasion. Candidates who can endure it demonstrate a specific type of resilience."

He spun the tool briefly. It made a high, thin whine.

"Mr. Orlov, you'll be doing this one too. I'll guide your hand initially."

Daniil took the tool. It was small, ergonomic, vibrating faintly.

*He can't. He's not going to sand the skin off my — that's not a real procedure, that can't be—*

"This is real," Dr. Brenn said, as if reading her face. "I know you're questioning it. Every candidate who gets this procedure questions it. It's real, it's approved, and it's necessary. The tissue will regenerate fully within seventy-two hours using accelerated healing protocols. No permanent damage. But for the next four hours — for the duration of this exam — you will have no skin on your anus, and everything that touches it will touch raw, exposed tissue."

He guided Daniil's hand between Lena's legs, positioning the spinning disc millimeters from the tightened, already-punctured ring of her anus.

"Start at the outside. Light, even pressure. Let the abrasive do the work. You'll see the superficial layer come off first — it'll look like very fine dust. Then the deeper layers. When you reach the dermis, the tissue will be bright red and will begin to bleed freely. That's when you know you're deep enough. Work your way around the entire external circumference, then we'll dilate her slightly to access the internal surface."

"Wait," Lena said. "Wait, I wasn't — the forum posts didn't say anything about—"

"That's the point," said Dr. Okafor.

Daniil pressed the spinning disc against the upper margin of her anus.

The sensation was unlike anything Lena had ever felt. The disc was rough — not razor-sharp, not the clean bite of a needle, but a grinding, rasping friction against the most sensitive external skin on her body. The tightening injections had made every nerve ending hypersensitive. The disc spun against skin that was already inflamed, already engorged with the chemical agent, and the feeling was—

She screamed. Not the sharp scream of a needle-stick but a rising, sustained, horrified scream as the abrasion *continued*. It didn't stop. The disc kept spinning, kept grinding, and she could feel the layers of skin being eaten away — a warm, wet, raw progression from discomfort to pain to *agony* as the protective epithelium was removed and the raw tissue beneath was exposed to the air and the vibration.

"You're doing well," Dr. Brenn said to Daniil. "Slow, even strokes. See how the tissue is changing color? That pink layer coming off is the epidermis. Keep going."

"Jesus," Daniil breathed. He was watching intently, his face inches from her anus, guiding the tool with careful, focused movements. "I can see the layers coming off. It's—" He adjusted the angle. The disc caught a slightly deeper spot and Lena's scream jumped an octave. "Oh, that got a reaction. Right there."

"That's where two of the injection punctures are," Dr. Yuen observed. "The tissue is already traumatized there. It'll be more sensitive."

"Should I spend more time there?"

"Yes," said Dr. Okafor. "Thorough preparation is important."

*He's asking if he should hurt me MORE THERE and they're saying YES and he's DOING IT and I can feel the skin being taken off me, I can feel the RAW — oh god oh god it BURNS—*

Daniil worked the disc in slow circles around the circumference of her anus. The first layer came off in fine particles. The second layer — the deeper epidermis — came off wetter, with the faintest sheen of moisture as the tissue wept. Then the dermis began to appear: bright, angry red, glistening, dotted with pinpoint bleeding from the capillary beds.

"More pressure now," Dr. Brenn instructed. "You need to get past the papillary dermis into the reticular layer. She'll bleed more. That's expected."

Daniil increased the pressure. The bleeding started in earnest — not a gush but a steady seep, blood welling up from thousands of tiny broken capillaries as the disc ground through the deeper skin layers. The blood smeared under the disc, mixing with the ground-off tissue, and Lena's anus — which had been pale pink and tightly clenched — was now a ring of raw, wet, red flesh, glistening under the surgical light, bleeding freely.

The pain was beyond anything the tightening injections had produced. It was *comprehensive* — not a point of pain but an entire area of pain, every nerve ending in her anus firing simultaneously, continuously, without pause, because the source of the pain — the raw exposure of the tissue — didn't stop when the disc moved on. Every millimeter that was sanded remained raw, remained screaming, and each new millimeter added to the total.

"I need to do the inside too?" Daniil asked.

"Yes. We'll dilate her slightly. Dr. Manova?"

Dr. Manova produced a small anal dilator — narrow, polished steel. She positioned it at the center of Lena's sanded anus and pressed.

The dilator touching raw, skinless tissue produced a shriek that the soundproofing absorbed. The tightened muscle fought the entry. Dr. Manova pushed firmly, and the dilator slipped inside the devastated sphincter, the polished steel sliding against raw dermis with absolutely no protective epithelial barrier. Blood smeared along its surface.

"Open it."

The dilator expanded, spreading the anal ring. The tightening agent made the muscle resist viciously, so the dilation itself was painful — but the pain of the mechanism was nothing compared to the pain of the raw, sanded tissue being *stretched*. The raw dermis pulled apart, micro-tears opening in the bleeding surface, fresh nerve endings exposed.

"Now sand the internal surface," Dr. Brenn told Daniil. "Same technique. You can see the mucosal lining just inside — it's the pinkish-purple tissue. Take it down to the submucosa."

Daniil guided the spinning disc inside the dilated opening. The internal tissue was even more sensitive than the external — the mucosal lining of the anal canal was thinner, wetter, more richly supplied with nerves. The disc contacted it and Lena's body went rigid against every restraint, a full-body clench of agony, her fingers and toes splaying, her jaw clenching against the chin cup, a sound coming from her throat that was barely human — a keening, guttering moan.

"This is the most incredible thing I've ever seen," Daniil said. His voice was thick. "The way the tissue just... opens up. You can see every layer. And she feels everything — look at her face. Lena, baby, I can see inside you right now. I can see the layers of your body coming apart."

*Stop. Stop stop stop. I can't take this. I can't — the burning is everything, it's my whole world, I can't think of anything except the fire in my anus and the sound of the disc and Daniil's voice talking about how beautiful it is — he's never sounded like that before — he sounds like he does when we're in bed and he's about to—*

"Almost done with the interior," Daniil reported. "How does it look?"

Dr. Brenn examined the result, peering through the dilator. The internal surface of Lena's anal canal, for the first inch and a half, was now raw submucosa — deep red, bleeding, every nerve ending exposed. The external ring was the same. The entire anus, inside and out, had been stripped of skin.

"Excellent work. Remove the dilator."

The dilator came out. Blood and tissue fluid dripped. Lena's anus clenched shut — the tightening agent still at full effect — and the act of clenching, which normally would have been painless, sent a nuclear flare of agony through the raw, skinless tissue. She wailed.

"Note the time," said Dr. Okafor. "That took eleven minutes. Faster than average. Mr. Orlov has a steady hand." He paused. "Now. The enema."

---

## PART FIVE — CAPSAICIN ENEMA

The reservoir hung on a tall IV-stand-like apparatus, positioned behind and above Lena's head so she couldn't see it directly — but she could smell it. The capsaicin concentration in the five liters of amber solution was strong enough to make her eyes water from three feet away.

Nurse Petric brought the nozzle. It was enormous. Four inches in diameter — wider than Lena's fist, wider than anything that had any right to enter a human anus. It was bulbous — a rounded, egg-shaped head tapering to a slightly narrower neck, then widening again to a flared base that would seat against her perineum and prevent expulsion. The surface was covered in small raised ridges — for grip and retention, according to the design specifications, but in practice they would drag across every millimeter of raw, bleeding tissue on entry.

"Five liters," Dr. Okafor said. "The solution is a medical-grade capsaicin suspension in warm saline — approximately 104 degrees Fahrenheit. The capsaicin concentration is 0.5%, which is roughly equivalent to direct contact with a habanero pepper. This will be introduced into your rectum and sigmoid colon through the nozzle you see here. You will retain the full volume for twenty minutes before expulsion is permitted."

*Zero point five percent capsaicin inside me. On raw, skinless tissue. Five liters. Twenty minutes.*

*The posts said 0.1%. They increased it. Because I read the posts.*

"Mr. Orlov, you'll be inserting the nozzle and controlling the flow."

Daniil took the nozzle. It was heavy, solid. He turned it in his hands, examining it, and then looked between Lena's legs at the target — her anus, stripped raw, swollen from the tightening injections, bleeding sluggishly, the ring of muscle clenched down so tight that the opening was barely visible.

"That's going in there?" he said. There was awe in his voice.

"It has to," said Dr. Brenn. "No lubricant for the initial insertion — the capsaicin solution itself will provide some, but the nozzle goes in dry against raw tissue. The tightening injections mean you'll need significant force. Steady, continuous pressure. Don't stop if she screams. She will scream."

"Wait—" Lena's voice cracked. "The posts said there would be lubricant. They said—"

"The posts described the standard protocol," Dr. Okafor said. "Your protocol has been modified. No lubricant. Additionally, the nozzle has been upsized from the standard three-inch model to the four-inch model."

*Four inches. No lubricant. On raw tissue. My anus has no skin and they're going to force four inches of ridged plastic into it with no lubricant.*

Daniil positioned the rounded head of the nozzle against Lena's anus. The contact of the smooth, cool surface against the raw, bleeding, hypersensitive tissue produced a jolt of pain that made her gasp even before any pressure was applied.

"I can feel how tight she is," Daniil said, pressing lightly. "The muscle is rock hard. It's not giving at all."

"Push harder," said Dr. Manova. "Steady, even pressure. The sphincter will yield — it has to, the nozzle is rigid. But with the tightening agent at full effect, it will require substantial force and the dilation will be agonizing."

Daniil pushed. The nozzle pressed against the sealed ring of raw muscle. Lena's anus resisted — the tightening agent had made the sphincter enormously strong, and the body's natural response to pain was to clench harder, and the pain of the contact was extreme, which made her clench harder, which increased the resistance, which required more force, which increased the pain.

"*Please*," Lena sobbed. "Daniil, please, it hurts, it *hurts*—"

"I know, baby," he said. He pushed harder. The nozzle began to dimple the tissue inward, the raw anus stretching around the leading curve of the bulbous head. The ridges on the surface caught on the bleeding tissue and dragged. "I know it hurts. You're doing amazing. God, Lena, you should see this — the way you're stretching around it. You're so tight and it's just... slowly opening you. It's beautiful."

"It's NOT BEAUTIFUL, it's—" She screamed as the widest part of the nozzle head reached the maximum stretch of her sphincter. The raw, skinless anus was spread to four inches now — a red, glistening ring of exposed tissue, blood running freely, the ridges of the nozzle scraping against raw dermis and submucosa. The pain was a white sheet that obliterated everything else.

Daniil gave a final firm push and the nozzle's widest point cleared the sphincter. The anus snapped tight around the narrower neck, the tightened muscle clamping down with ferocious force, and the nozzle was seated. The flared base pressed against her perineum.

Lena was hyperventilating — short, sharp, animal breaths. Her face was white except for the red blotches of exertion on her cheeks. Her eyes were wide and unfocused.

"Nozzle seated," Daniil reported, slightly breathless himself. "She's bleeding a lot around the base."

"Expected," said Dr. Yuen. "The raw tissue plus the forced dilation. The blood will mix with the capsaicin solution internally. It'll intensify the burn."

"Ready for flow," said Nurse Petric, who had opened the valve on the tubing.

"Begin," said Dr. Okafor.

The warm capsaicin solution began to flow through the nozzle and into Lena's body.

The first sensation was warmth — deep, internal warmth as the liquid entered her rectum. For perhaps two seconds, it was almost soothing. Then the capsaicin hit the raw, sanded tissue of her internal anal canal.

Lena had thought the sanding was the worst pain she would feel. She had been wrong.

The capsaicin burned. It burned the way the tightening agent had burned but a thousand times worse — a chemical fire that didn't just sit on the surface but seeped into the exposed tissue, into the open capillaries, into every nerve ending that the sanding had exposed. It was like having the inside of her anus painted with liquid fire. And it kept coming — the flow continued, pushing deeper, filling her rectum, the burning solution contacting intact mucosa now but also flowing over the raw, denuded area again and again as the volume expanded and shifted.

Her scream was continuous now. Not a scream, exactly — a sound. A high, thin, trembling wail that rose and fell with her breathing but never stopped.

"Flow rate is 250 milliliters per minute," Nurse Petric reported. "Retention time starts when the full five liters are administered. Current volume: 500 ml."

"How does the cramping feel?" Dr. Brenn asked, not addressing Lena but the room at large, clinically.

"Based on her abdominal contractions and the rhythm of her vocalization, she's experiencing significant cramping already," said Dr. Manova. "The capsaicin accelerates peristalsis. At five liters, the colon distension combined with the peristaltic spasms and the chemical burn will be in the severe range."

*The liquid fire is filling me. I can feel it rising, moving deeper, pushing into parts of me I've never felt before. My insides are on fire. My stomach is cramping — hard, wringing cramps, like the worst period pain I've ever had multiplied by — I can't — I'm losing — I can't think —*

"One liter," said Nurse Petric.

Lena's flat stomach had begun to distend slightly — a barely perceptible swelling below her navel.

"I think she's trying to expel," Daniil observed. He had his hand on the base of the nozzle, holding it in place. "I can feel her pushing against the nozzle."

"She can't expel around it," Dr. Brenn said. "The flared base and the tightened sphincter create a seal. But the attempts will hurt — every push will scrape the raw tissue against the ridges."

Lena's body was trying, involuntarily, to push the nozzle out — the same reflex that made the body try to expel any foreign object. But each push flexed her raw, skinless anus against the ridged surface of the nozzle, and each push sent a bolt of sharp, scraping pain through the deep chemical burn. Her wail stuttered with each attempt, catching in her throat.

"Two liters."

The distension was visible now. Her stomach was swelling, the skin stretching over the expanding volume of liquid inside her colon. The cramps were coming in waves — she could see them, could see the muscles of her abdomen rippling under the skin.

"She told me," Daniil said — and Lena, through her fog of pain, registered his voice with a distant horror — "that her worst fear, the thing she had nightmares about, was losing control. Having an accident. Being seen. She told me that once in middle school she—"

"*Don't*," Lena gasped. "Daniil, don't tell them—"

"She had an accident in front of her whole class. She's never gotten over it. She told me she'd rather die than have that happen again."

"Thank you," said Dr. Okafor. "That's relevant. Candidate Vasik, the twenty-minute retention period is designed to bring you to the very edge of loss of control. The capsaicin will intensify peristalsis to the point where your body is fighting to expel the solution with everything it has. The nozzle will prevent expulsion. When we finally remove the nozzle, you will likely have zero seconds of control. The expulsion will be immediate and involuntary."

*He told them. He told them the worst thing. And they're going to use it. I'm going to — in front of all of them — I can't — I can't —*

"Three liters."

Her stomach was noticeably distended now — the slim, flat abdomen swollen as though several months pregnant. The cramps were severe, constant, the waves overlapping. The capsaicin burn had spread through her entire rectum and was advancing through the sigmoid colon, a line of fire moving deeper into her body.

"I can see her stomach moving," Daniil said, and his voice had that quality again — thick, fascinated. "The cramps are visible from the outside. Look at her."

He placed his un-gloved hand on her swollen stomach. Lena flinched. His hand was warm. Through the skin, he could feel the liquid shifting, the muscles contracting.

"You're so full," he murmured. "You've never had anything inside you and now you have three liters and it's pepper solution and it's burning you from the inside. This is..." He trailed off, pressing his hand more firmly, feeling the cramps pulse under his palm.

"Four liters."

Lena was sobbing between wails now. The distension was painful in itself — her colon was stretching to accommodate volume it was never designed to hold, the walls thinning, the nerves firing stretch-pain signals on top of the capsaicin's chemical burn on top of the cramping on top of the continuous agony from her raw, violated anus.

"Please," she moaned. "Please stop. I'll do anything. Please take it out."

"One more liter," said Dr. Okafor. "And then twenty minutes of retention."

"I *can't*—"

"You can. You will. Every candidate does."

"Five liters. Full volume."

The flow stopped. Lena's stomach was grotesquely distended for her small frame — a taut, round swell that looked alien on her petite body. The cramps were massive, visible, her abdominal muscles clenching in waves that rippled visibly under the stretched skin. The capsaicin burn had reached far up into her colon. Inside her, five liters of liquid fire pressed against every surface, seeped into every fold, touched every nerve.

"Retention timer starts now," said Nurse Petric. "Twenty minutes."

The next twenty minutes were the longest of Lena's life.

The cramps intensified. The capsaicin didn't diminish — it *built*, the chemical binding to pain receptors and refusing to let go, each passing minute worse than the last. Her body's desperate attempts to expel the solution grew more and more powerful — wave after wave of peristalsis, her colon squeezing down on the liquid, trying to force it out through the anus that the nozzle had sealed shut. Each wave pushed liquid against the raw, sanded tissue of her anal canal, and each wave sent the burning solution deeper into the bleeding, exposed capillary beds.

At five minutes, she was begging continuously, a litany of "please" and "stop" and "I can't" that the doctors recorded and noted.

At ten minutes, she broke down. Not a gradual deterioration but a sudden, complete collapse — her sobs became howls, her body thrashing against the restraints with panicked, animal strength, her eyes rolling, saliva running from the corner of her mouth. Dr. Manova noted "psychological break event at T+10, first episode" on the chart.

At fifteen minutes, she went quiet. Not calm — a dissociative quiet, her eyes glazed, her breathing rapid and shallow. Daniil, who had been watching with rapt, flushed attention, leaned close to her face.

"Lena. Stay here. Don't go away."

Her eyes focused on him. He was smiling. Not cruelly — it was the smile she'd seen in private moments, the smile that preceded "I love you" or "you're beautiful." But it was here, now, over her devastated, swollen, burning body.

"You're doing so well," he said. "You're going to go to space."

"Why..." she whispered. "Why do you look like that?"

"Like what?"

"Happy."

He was quiet for a moment. Then: "Because this is the most intimate thing I've ever experienced. I've never been this close to you. I can see every part of you, inside and out. I can feel your pain. And I..." He touched her face. "I've never been more attracted to you."

*He loves this. He genuinely loves this. And I can't even be angry because I asked him to come and I asked him not to let me quit and he's not letting me quit. He's just... also enjoying it.*

"Eighteen minutes," said Nurse Petric.

"Nineteen."

"Twenty. Retention complete. Prepare for expulsion."

"Mr. Orlov," said Dr. Okafor, "remove the nozzle."

Daniil gripped the base of the nozzle. Lena felt the shift and her body responded instantly — a massive, involuntary push, her colon contracting, trying to force out everything, everything, all five liters, all at once.

"On three," Daniil said. "One—"

He pulled it out on one. The four-inch nozzle dragged through her raw, skinless anus, the ridges scraping across exposed tissue, blood and capsaicin solution spraying as the seal broke. The nozzle cleared her body with a wet, sucking sound.

And Lena lost control completely. The expulsion was immediate, total, and unstoppable — her body voiding five liters of capsaicin-stained, blood-tinged liquid with violent force. The cramps continued through it, each wave pushing more out, her body convulsing. She screamed — not from pain now but from the deep, soul-level humiliation of losing control of her body in front of six people, in the bright surgical light, strapped open and unable to close her legs or turn away or do anything except let it happen.

The station was designed for this — the cutout beneath her directed everything into a collection basin. But the sounds, the loss of control, the knowledge that everyone was watching — these could not be engineered away.

"She's crying harder now than she was during the sanding," Dr. Brenn noted clinically. "The psychological component exceeds the physical."

"As predicted," said Dr. Okafor. "Given the boyfriend's information about her control-related trauma."

*I want to die. I want to die. I don't want to go to space. I don't want anything. I just want this to stop and I want to disappear and I never want anyone to look at me again.*

But she didn't say "stop." She didn't say "I quit." She cried, and voided, and shook, and endured.

When the expulsion was complete, Nurse Petric cleaned the area with a saline rinse that felt like acid on the raw tissue. The collection basin was removed and replaced. Lena's anus was gaping slightly now — the forced dilation of the nozzle had temporarily overcome even the tightening agent — and it was a vivid, bleeding red, raw from the sanding, swollen from the injections, burned from the capsaicin.

"Good," said Dr. Okafor. "Anal prep is complete. The sigmoidoscopy will be performed later, after some of the other procedures. Let her anus re-tighten. It'll hurt more that way."

---

## PART SIX — BREAST AND NIPPLE EXAMINATION (NEEDLE MAMMOGRAPHY)

The station rotated smoothly, changing Lena's position from the deep lithotomy to a more upright, seated angle. The leg cradles remained spread — she would not be permitted to close her legs at any point during the four hours — but the upper body was now the focus.

The mammography compression units swung into position on their articulated arms — two flat, clear plates for each breast, upper and lower, mounted on hydraulic rams that could apply hundreds of pounds of compression force. The plates were transparent so the physicians could observe the tissue during compression.

"Candidate's breasts are B-cup, which places her in the lower range for the needle-mammogram protocol," Dr. Manova explained, adjusting the position of the plates. "Standard protocol for B-cup is twelve 8-gauge needles per breast on the first pass. Given the Protocol 7-C modification, we're increasing to eighteen."

"Eighteen 8-gauge needles," Lena repeated, her voice hollow. "Per breast."

"Yes. The needles are spring-loaded and fire simultaneously when compression reaches the target threshold. They penetrate the full thickness of the breast tissue — entry from the top plate, tips terminating just short of the chest wall. At 8-gauge, each needle is approximately 3.26 millimeters in diameter."

Lena looked at the plates. She could see the needles — recessed into the upper plate, their tips flush with the compression surface, arranged in a grid pattern. Eighteen of them per plate. They were thick — visibly thick, each one a dark circle against the clear surface, each one a steel rod that was about to be driven through her breast.

"After the 8-gauge pass, there's a second pass," Dr. Manova continued. "One hundred 18-gauge needles per breast, at higher compression."

"One hundred—"

"Per breast. Yes."

*Thirty-six 8-gauge needles through my breasts and then two hundred 18-gauge needles. My breasts are going to have two hundred and thirty-six holes in them. I read about this in the forum — the girl who described it said 'I couldn't stop bleeding for six hours.' And she had the standard protocol. Mine is worse.*

"Mr. Orlov, come here. You'll be operating the compression controls."

Daniil moved to the control panel. His hands were trembling slightly — not with fear.

"The compression is hydraulic," Dr. Manova explained. "This dial controls the pressure. You'll increase it slowly until the indicator hits the green zone — that's the target compression for the 8-gauge pass. At that point, the needles fire automatically. But you're controlling how fast the compression builds. Slower is more painful — it gives her more time to feel the crush before the needles fire."

"So I should go slow," Daniil said.

"As slow as you'd like."

Dr. Manova positioned Lena's left breast between the plates. The lower plate slid under the breast, lifting it slightly. The upper plate descended until it rested on the upper surface. Lena could see her own breast sandwiched between the two clear surfaces — the small mound of tissue, the pink-brown nipple pressed against the lower plate, the eighteen needle tips in the upper plate sitting directly on the skin of the upper breast surface.

"She has really sensitive breasts," Daniil said. "When we're together, even light touching makes her gasp. She once told me that her nipples are connected directly to — she said even cold air on them is almost too much."

"That's consistent with the nerve density we'd expect," said Dr. Manova. "The 8-gauge needles will be particularly effective."

"Baby," Lena said, looking at Daniil. Her face was still streaked with tears from the enema. "Please don't go slow. Please just — fast. Get it over with."

Daniil looked at her. Then at Dr. Manova. Then at the compression dial.

He began turning it. Slowly.

The plates began to close. Lena felt the pressure immediately — her breast was small, with limited tissue to compress, so even slight plate movement translated to significant compression. The tissue flattened, spreading laterally, the pressure distributed across the entire breast. It was uncomfortable immediately and painful within seconds, a deep ache as the fibrous and glandular tissue compressed, the blood vessels squeezing shut, the nerves firing escalating pain signals.

"You're doing really well with the pace," Dr. Brenn commented to Daniil. "Look at her face — you can see the exact moment the pain transitions from 'ache' to 'agony.'"

Daniil was watching Lena's face intently, turning the dial a fraction at a time, watching her expression change — the tightening around the eyes, the clenching of the jaw against the chin cup, the moment her composure broke and the cry started.

"There," he murmured. "Right there. That's the most incredible expression."

The compression continued. Lena's breast was flattened to a fraction of its normal depth, the tissue bulging at the edges of the plates, the nipple distorted and pressed flat, the skin blanched white from the pressure except where it was flushed red. The needle tips were in full contact with the skin now, pressed into it by the compression, dimpling the surface, eighteen small indentations in a grid across the upper breast.

"Almost to the target," said Nurse Petric, watching the pressure gauge.

Lena was staring at the needle tips pressed against her breast. She could see them through the transparent plate. Each one was a circle of dark steel against her white, compressed skin. Each one was about to fire through her breast.

"Daniil," she whispered. "I'm scared."

"I know," he said, and turned the dial the final increment.

The indicator hit the green zone. The mechanism fired.

Eighteen 8-gauge needles deployed simultaneously, spring-driven, punching through the skin of her upper breast, through the compressed tissue — glandular, fibrous, fatty — and down, down, through the full flattened thickness, the tips emerging from the underside of the tissue and pressing against the lower plate. Each needle traversed the entire breast in a fraction of a second. The sensation was eighteen simultaneous impalement points — not sharp stings but deep, brutal punches, the 3.26mm diameter of each needle making an entry wound that was less a puncture and more a core sample, a cylinder of tissue displaced by each steel rod.

The sound Lena made was not a scream. It was a gasp — a deep, sucking inhalation as her body tried to process the information that eighteen steel rods had just been driven through her breast. Then the pain hit, a half-second behind the physical event, and the scream came. It was raw, primal, and it broke halfway through into a series of staccato cries that coincided with her racing heartbeat, each pulse sending a throb of agony through the perforated tissue.

"Needles deployed, all eighteen penetrating successfully," said Dr. Manova, examining the underside of the plate where the needle tips were visible, pushed through. Each tip was dotted with blood and a tiny amount of tissue. "Hold compression for thirty seconds to allow the tissue to stabilize around the needles."

"She's bleeding," Daniil observed. Blood was welling around each needle where it entered the skin — eighteen small circles of red on the white, compressed surface. "A lot."

"8-gauge produces significant tissue channels. The bleeding will continue after the needles are withdrawn and compression is released. That's expected."

The thirty seconds were an eternity. Lena could feel every needle individually — eighteen foreign objects transfixing her breast, each one a rod of cold steel through warm, living tissue, each one surrounded by a burning halo of traumatized nerves. The compression held everything flat and still, so she couldn't even flinch away from the sensation.

"Retracting."

The needles withdrew simultaneously. Eighteen channels through her breast, each 3.26mm in diameter, each beginning to fill with blood as the compression released. The plates separated. Her breast, released from compression, slowly regained some of its shape — but it was changed. Eighteen puncture wounds wept blood freely, the entry points on the upper surface and the exit points on the lower surface each oozing steadily. The skin was mottled red and white. The nipple, which had been compressed flat, was swollen and flushed.

"Right breast now," said Dr. Manova, repositioning the apparatus.

"Can I control the compression again?" Daniil asked.

"Of course."

"This time I want to go even slower."

*No. No no no—*

The right breast was positioned between the plates. Daniil began the compression. He went slower — agonizingly slower, a fraction of a turn at a time, watching Lena's face with an intensity that was almost tender.

"You know what I keep thinking about?" he said conversationally as the pressure built. "That time you let me touch your breasts for the first time. You were so nervous. You kept saying 'gentle, gentle.' And I was. I was so gentle."

"Don't—" Lena gasped.

"I'm not going to be gentle today. And you're going to let me, because you want to go to space."

The compression reached its target. The needles fired. Eighteen more steel rods through her breast. The same gasp, the same delayed scream, the same bleeding. But worse, somehow — whether because the right breast was more sensitive or because the accumulated pain and trauma of everything before had lowered her threshold, the scream was longer, louder, more ragged, and it ended in a full-body convulsion against the restraints that Dr. Okafor noted as "second psychological break event."

"Retracting. Good. Now — second pass. One hundred 18-gauge needles per breast at higher compression."

"One hundred," Lena moaned. "Please—"

"The 18-gauge needles are smaller in diameter — 1.27mm — but there are significantly more of them and the compression is higher. The effect is a denser pattern of perforation. The breast will look like a pincushion when we're done."

The new plates were swapped in — the upper plate studded with one hundred 18-gauge needle tips in a close-packed grid. The coverage was nearly total — every square centimeter of compressed breast would have a needle through it.

Left breast first. Compression began — Daniil controlling, slow as before, but the target was higher this time. The breast flattened further, the tissue compressed beyond the previous threshold, already-bleeding 8-gauge wounds reopening under the pressure, blood smearing between the plates.

At peak compression, one hundred needles fired.

Lena convulsed. The sound she made was thin, reedy, almost inaudible — she had screamed so much her voice was deteriorating. One hundred simultaneous punctures through already-traumatized tissue, each needle passing through or near the channels left by the 8-gauge needles, some of them threading directly through existing wounds, widening them.

"The pattern is beautiful," Daniil said, looking at the plate. He was breathing hard. "Like a constellation. Every hole is bleeding. Her whole breast is just... blood and holes."

When the needles retracted and the compression released, Lena's left breast was weeping blood from over a hundred punctures in addition to the original eighteen. The surface of the skin was dotted so densely with wounds that some of the blood trails merged, creating a red sheen that covered nearly the entire breast. Blood ran down the underside, dripping from the nipple area.

The right breast received the same treatment. By the time both breasts had completed both passes, Lena had 236 needle wounds — 118 per breast — and both breasts were streaming blood, the small B-cups flushed red and swollen, the nipples engorged and bleeding from multiple punctures that had passed through the nipple tissue itself.

"Now," said Dr. Manova, "the nipple-specific examination."

"There's more?" Lena's voice was a cracked whisper.

"The mammography assessed the breast tissue generally. The nipples require specific evaluation — measurement, injection, and sensitivity testing."

Dr. Manova produced a tray of instruments: small-gauge needles — 20-gauge and 22-gauge — in multiple lengths, several syringes filled with different colored solutions, a pair of calibrated clamps, and a device Lena didn't recognize — a small box with two thin probes ending in needle points.

"Mr. Orlov, we'll need you for this. Take the measurement needles first."

Daniil took a 20-gauge needle and positioned it horizontally at the base of Lena's left nipple, which was erect, hard, swollen, and bleeding from several mammography punctures.

"You're going to measure the nipple diameter by passing a needle straight through, at the base, perpendicular to the chest wall," Dr. Manova instructed. "Then we'll measure the length with a second needle passed vertically, from base to tip."

The first needle went through the base of the nipple horizontally. The tissue was dense — nipple tissue was different from breast tissue, more fibrous, more nerve-rich. Lena felt the needle's entire passage — the pop through the outer skin, the grinding resistance of the dense interior, the sharp exit through the other side. It was a focused, fierce pain, different from the mammography's distributed agony. This was concentrated in the most sensitive point of her breast.

She whimpered — she was too hoarse to scream.

"Diameter: 11 millimeters," Dr. Manova measured. "Now the vertical."

A second needle, passed from the base of the nipple upward through the tissue to the very tip. Lena felt it tracking through her nipple, felt the tip advancing through the interior, felt it press against the inside of the tip and then break through. Blood welled from the very top of her nipple, a single bead of red on the pink-brown surface.

"Length: 14 millimeters when erect. Good. Mr. Orlov, repeat for the right nipple."

Daniil performed the measurements on the right nipple with careful, steady hands. Two needles per nipple — left in place as markers, each one a thin steel rod transfixing the small, sensitive bud. Lena now had four needles in her nipples, two per side, forming crosses.

"Now the injections. Each nipple will receive three injections — an irritant solution to increase sensitivity, a vasodilating agent to increase blood flow and swelling, and a nerve-stimulating compound that will keep the pain response heightened for the remainder of the exam."

"All of that into her nipples?" Daniil asked.

"Into and through the nipple tissue, yes."

Daniil injected. Six injections total — three per nipple, each delivered with a 22-gauge needle pushed deep into the nipple through different angles, each syringe depressed slowly while the measurement needles were still in place, the liquids filling the dense tissue. Lena's nipples swelled visibly with each injection — engorging, flushing deeper red, the tissue expanding around the existing needles.

The irritant solution hit first. Lena's nipples had been in severe pain already — but the irritant elevated it to a pulsing, burning throb that synced with her heartbeat and didn't fade. Then the vasodilator — her nipples flushed almost purple, blood vessels dilating, the tissue becoming hot and hypersensitive. Then the nerve stimulant — and suddenly every sensation was amplified, the needles that were still in her nipples going from painful to excruciating, the air on the wet blood surface like sandpaper.

"Leave the measurement needles in for now," said Dr. Manova. "They'll provide continuous pain stimulus during the next procedures."

Lena looked down at herself. Her breasts were covered in blood, streaming from over two hundred punctures. Her nipples were transfixed with needles, swollen to nearly double their normal size, flushed purple-red, throbbing visibly. She looked like she'd been tortured, because she had been.

*I'm bleeding. Both breasts are bleeding. My nipples have needles through them and they're burning and I'm not even halfway through. The vaginal procedures haven't started. The urethra hasn't been touched. The clitoris hasn't been touched. The cervix and uterus haven't been touched. And the sigmoidoscope is still waiting.*

---

## PART SEVEN — CLITORAL EXAMINATION

"We're going to move to the external genital examination now," said Dr. Okafor. "Beginning with the clitoris."

The station tilted back to the lithotomy position. The surgical light repositioned, focusing between her spread thighs. The full extent of her vulva was illuminated — the closed outer labia, slightly swollen from hours of gravity-dependent blood flow in the spread position, the hood of the clitoris just visible at the apex.

Dr. Yuen sat between her legs on the stool. He used two fingers to gently part the outer labia, then the inner labia — thin, pink, symmetrical — exposing the vestibule. At the top, the clitoral hood — a small fold of tissue — was retracted gently, revealing the clitoris itself.

It was small. A pink, glistening bead, perhaps 5mm in visible diameter, exquisitely sensitive, now exposed to the light and the air and the gaze of six people.

"Mr. Orlov, I understand from our conversation that the candidate's clitoris is exceptionally sensitive. You said she once had an intense reaction from — what was it?"

"From me breathing on it," Daniil said. "We were lying in bed and I kissed down her stomach and when I got close, just my breath made her jump so hard she almost fell off the bed."

"And she's never allowed direct touch?"

"Never. She said it was too sensitive. 'Electric,' she called it."

"Excellent. That level of sensitivity will provide very clear data."

*He told them about that too. He told them about every intimate moment. Everything I whispered in the dark when I trusted him completely.*

"The clitoral examination," Dr. Yuen explained, "involves measurement, injection, and electro-stimulation testing. We'll begin with measurement."

He held up a 20-gauge needle, two inches long.

"The glans clitoris will be measured by passing a needle through its widest point. Then we'll inject a sensitivity-enhancing compound directly into the glans. Then we'll use electrical current through needle-electrodes to test the pain-to-stimulus response curve."

"The needle goes through the clitoris?" Lena's voice was barely there.

"Through it, yes. The glans clitoris has approximately eight thousand nerve endings — the highest density of any structure in the human body. The measurement needle will stimulate a significant percentage of them."

"Mr. Orlov, hold the hood back with your left hand. You'll pass the measurement needle with your right."

Daniil positioned himself. His left thumb and forefinger pinned the clitoral hood back, fully exposing the small, glistening glans. His right hand held the 20-gauge needle.

"I can feel her pulse through it," he said. "It's throbbing."

"Eight thousand nerve endings. All about to experience a 20-gauge needle. Slow insertion, please. We want her to feel every millimeter."

Daniil placed the needle tip against the side of Lena's clitoris.

The contact alone — cold steel against the most sensitive point on her body — produced a full-body flinch that the restraints absorbed. A sound came from Lena's throat — not a scream but a whimper, high and thin, the sound of someone who knows what's about to happen and cannot stop it.

He pushed.

The needle entered the glans of the clitoris.

The pain was — there is no adequate comparison. The forum posts hadn't described clitoral needles. Lena had no framework for what she felt. The 8,000 nerve endings of the clitoral glans, compressed into a space smaller than a pea, fired simultaneously as the needle displaced tissue and severed microscopic nerve branches. The sensation was electrical, sharp, deep, radiating — it shot down through her pelvis, up through her abdomen, it made her vision white out for a moment, it made her ears ring.

Her scream was raw and absolute, tearing from her damaged throat with a force that surprised even the doctors. Her body convulsed against every restraint, the cuffs biting into her skin as every muscle fired at once.

Daniil didn't stop. The needle continued through — slowly, as instructed — traversing the tiny glans, the tip emerging from the other side in a bead of bright red blood.

"Glans diameter: 6 millimeters," Dr. Yuen measured. "Leave the needle in place. Now the injection."

A syringe — very small, 1ml, attached to a 25-gauge needle — was prepared with a clear solution.

"This is a topical neural excitant," Dr. Yuen said. "Injected directly into the clitoral glans, it will increase sensitivity approximately tenfold for the next three hours. Everything she feels in her clitoris will be ten times more intense."

"Can I do the injection?" Daniil asked.

"Absolutely."

He took the syringe. The injection needle entered the top of the clitoris — a third needle now in the tiny structure, alongside the measurement needle already transfixing it. He depressed the plunger. The neural excitant entered the tissue.

Lena's scream changed quality. It became higher, more desperate, as the chemical took effect and the existing pain — the measurement needle still in her clitoris — amplified dramatically. Her clitoris felt like it was being held in a flame. The neural excitant made every nerve ending hypersensitive, and the needle that was already there became an instrument of magnified torment.

"Beautiful response," Dr. Yuen said. "The neural excitant is clearly effective. Now — electro-stimulation."

Two thin needle-electrodes were inserted into the clitoris — one on each side, flanking the measurement needle. They were connected to the small box Lena had seen earlier. Dr. Yuen set the parameters — low current, increasing in increments.

"Mr. Orlov, you'll control the current dial. Start at the lowest setting and increase by one step every five seconds. We're mapping her pain-to-stimulus curve."

Daniil turned the dial to the first setting. A tiny current flowed through Lena's clitoris, between the two electrodes, passing through tissue that was already pierced, injected, and hypersensitized.

The first setting made her gasp. The second made her cry. The third made her scream. By the fifth setting, she was convulsing again, the electricity stimulating nerve endings that the neural excitant had made impossibly sensitive, each pulse a jolt of white-hot pain through the epicenter of her nervous system.

"She's going to hit the overload threshold soon," Dr. Yuen observed. "Keep going."

At the seventh setting, Lena blacked out. Her eyes rolled back, her body went limp, her scream cut off mid-breath.

"Overload at setting seven," Dr. Yuen noted. "Nurse, revive."

Nurse Petric administered a stimulant injection — upper arm, quick, efficient. Lena's eyes fluttered open. For a moment, she didn't seem to know where she was. Then the pain — which hadn't stopped during her brief unconsciousness — reasserted itself, and she screamed again.

"Electrodes out. Measurement needle out. Let's document and move on."

The needles were withdrawn from her clitoris. It was bleeding — bright red, the blood vivid against the pink tissue, streaming down over her perineum. The small bead of flesh was visibly swollen, engorged from the vasodilation and the nerve stimulant, throbbing with her heartbeat. Each throb was agony.

---

## PART EIGHT — URETHRAL EXAMINATION

"The urethra," said Dr. Brenn, "is next. The candidate has a standard female urethra — approximately 4 centimeters in length, approximately 6 millimeters in resting diameter. The exam protocol requires dilation to maximum safe diameter, sounding, measurement by needle insertion, and injection of diagnostic agents."

"Maximum safe diameter?" Lena whispered.

"For a candidate your size, we'll dilate to approximately 14 millimeters — just over half an inch. The standard female urethra can be dilated to this point without permanent structural damage, though the process is extremely painful and there will be bleeding."

*Half an inch. My urethra. The hole I pee from, stretched to half an inch. That's — I can barely find it when I'm in the shower, it's tiny, how can they stretch it to—*

"Mr. Orlov, this is a delicate procedure. I'll walk you through each step and you'll perform the dilation yourself."

Dr. Brenn laid out the urethral sounds — a graduated set of smooth, curved metal rods in ascending diameter, each polished to a mirror finish. The smallest was barely a millimeter in diameter. The largest was 14mm — alarming, thick, incongruously large for the small, almost invisible opening it was destined for.

"We begin with identification and exposure," Dr. Brenn said. He parted Lena's inner labia, which had been held open by the positioning but needed further retraction. Small, sharp-toothed clamps — two on each side — gripped the thin labial tissue and pulled the labia wide, fully exposing the vestibule. The clamps were mounted to the station's instrument arms and could be adjusted and locked. Lena felt the sharp bite of eight small teeth in her labia — a minor pain, almost unnoticed against the continuing agony of her clitoris, breasts, and anus.

The urethral meatus was now visible — a tiny slit, barely perceptible, located just below the clitoris and above the vaginal opening. Dr. Brenn touched it with a moistened swab and Lena flinched.

"She's responsive. Good. Mr. Orlov, take the first sound — the 3mm. Apply it to the meatus with gentle pressure and let it find the angle."

Daniil took the thin metal rod. He placed the smooth, rounded tip against the tiny opening of her urethra. The meatus dimpled inward. Then the sound slid in — slender, smooth, disappearing into her body with a strange ease that belied what was to come.

"That's inside me," Lena said, her voice strange. "I can feel it — going up. It's—"

"The urethra is short. You'll feel the sound reach the bladder sphincter in a moment."

The tip of the sound reached the internal sphincter and pressed against it. Lena gasped — a deep, internal pressure, an urgent sensation that made her feel like she needed to urinate.

"Good. Withdraw and advance to the next size."

The sounds progressed. 3mm, 4mm, 5mm — each one wider, each one stretching the urethral walls a little more. By 6mm, Lena could feel the stretch — a burning, splitting sensation as the sound pushed the elastic tissue wider than it had ever been. By 8mm, she was whimpering with each insertion, the sound's passage up the urethra producing a sensation that was equal parts pain and an overwhelming, uncontrollable urge to urinate. By 10mm, she was crying again, the stretch visible externally — her meatus dilated to a small, round opening that gaped slightly each time the sound was withdrawn.

"She's really struggling," Daniil observed. He was performing each insertion himself, carefully, under Dr. Brenn's guidance. "I can feel how tight she is around the sound. Every millimeter of stretch, I can feel the resistance."

"She'll resist more at 12mm. That's typically the threshold where candidates report the pain transitions from 'stretching' to 'tearing.'"

"Is it actually tearing?"

"Micro-tears in the mucosa, yes. She'll bleed. But no structural damage."

The 12mm sound went in. Lena screamed — a different scream from the clitoral or anal ones, a lower, more guttural cry that came from deep in her abdomen as the urethra was forced to a diameter double its resting state. She could feel the sound inside her like a rod of fire, every millimeter of the urethral lining protesting, the micro-tears opening, the blood beginning.

"Almost there," Daniil murmured. "Two more sizes."

13mm. The stretch was visible — the meatus open, red, distended, a trickle of blood running from the opening around the polished shaft of the sound. Lena's lower abdomen was cramping, the bladder spasming in response to the massive intrusion.

14mm. The final sound — the largest — was the diameter of a thick pencil. Daniil placed it at the opening and paused.

"This is going to be the hardest one," Dr. Brenn said. "Push slow and steady. Don't back off if she screams."

"I won't," Daniil said.

The 14mm sound entered Lena's urethra. The stretch was enormous — the tissue blanching white around the shaft as it dilated to its maximum, tiny tears opening in the mucosal surface, blood welling and running. The sensation for Lena was of being split open — not violently but relentlessly, a slow, inexorable widening that she could feel in her entire pelvis, a burning, tearing pressure that made her abdomen clench and her legs shake in the restraints.

"It's in," Daniil said. "All the way. She's at 14 millimeters."

"Hold it there. We need the measurement needles."

Dr. Brenn handed Daniil two 22-gauge needles. "Pass them through the urethral walls — one on each side, at the 3 and 9 o'clock positions, about one centimeter inside the meatus. They'll go through the wall thickness."

Daniil, with the 14mm sound still embedded in Lena's urethra, inserted the measurement needles through the distended tissue. Each one passed through the stretched, thinned urethral wall — in one side, through, and out the other, the tip entering the surrounding tissue. The urethral wall at 14mm dilation was thin enough that Daniil could feel the needle pass through the full thickness in barely a centimeter.

"Wall thickness at max dilation: approximately 2 millimeters," Dr. Brenn measured. "Now inject."

Two injections into the urethral walls — one through each measurement needle. The solution was an irritant compound similar to what had been used in the nipples. The urethral lining, already stretched and torn, received the chemical with an intensity that made Lena's scream reach a new pitch. The irritant seeped into the micro-tears, into the raw surfaces, amplifying every sensation.

"Remove the sound but leave the needles."

The 14mm sound was withdrawn. Lena's urethra, dilated to maximum, gaped — a round, red, bleeding opening that slowly began to contract but remained widely dilated, the two measurement needles still transfixing the walls.

"The urethra will remain hypersensitive for the next several hours," Dr. Brenn said. "The candidate may experience involuntary urination during subsequent procedures. This is normal."

*I might wet myself. In front of all of them. On top of everything else. Oh god.*

The needles were removed. Two more points of blood.

---

## PART NINE — VAGINAL SPECULUM EXAMINATION

"Now," said Dr. Okafor, "the vaginal examination. This is the centerpiece of the physical."

On the instrument tray: the five speculums, arranged in ascending size. The smallest — the Collins Large — gleamed under the light, its blade surfaces studded with recessed 14-gauge needles. The largest was a custom instrument so wide that Lena's mind refused to process it.

"Candidate, you're a virgin. Your hymen was confirmed intact at the pre-screening. The first speculum insertion will rupture it."

"I know."

"Your boyfriend will be performing all five speculum insertions."

Lena looked at Daniil. He was staring at the speculums. At the needles on them.

"Five speculums," he said. "Each one bigger."

"Each one bigger, each one with more needles, each one applying more stretch to the vaginal walls. And each one has the capacity to deploy its needles on command, injecting whatever we choose into the vaginal tissue while the speculum holds her open."

"What will you inject?"

"First speculum: local irritant. Second: vasodilating agent. Third: neural sensitizer — same compound used in the clitoris. Fourth: a capsaicin-based solution similar to the enema but more concentrated. Fifth: a combination of all four."

"And the needles fire while the speculum is inside her?"

"Yes. They deploy through the vaginal walls while the speculum holds them taut. The candidate feels the speculum stretching her, then the needles penetrating from inside the stretch, then the injection. It's a three-layered pain experience."

"Additionally," Dr. Manova said, "speculums two through five may be electrified. The blades carry a low-level current that stimulates the vaginal nerve endings continuously while the speculum is in place."

*Five speculums. Five. Each one bigger than the last, starting with a Collins Large, and I've never had anything bigger than one finger inside me. I'm a virgin. He's going to put five speculums in me with needles and electricity and chemicals and each one is bigger and I'm going to lose my virginity to a speculum that my boyfriend pushes into me.*

"First speculum," said Dr. Okafor. "Collins Large. Mr. Orlov."

Daniil picked it up. The Collins Large was a flat-blade speculum — two wide, flat metal blades that inserted together and then separated by a ratchet mechanism, spreading the vaginal walls apart for visualization. The blades were wide — wider than a standard speculum — and lined with rows of 14-gauge needles, thirty-two total, sixteen per blade. The needles were flush with the blade surface, invisible unless you knew to look for the small circles of their tips.

"No lubricant," said Dr. Manova.

"None?"

"Her protocol specifies no lubricant for the first speculum. The friction against virgin tissue produces useful data."

Daniil positioned the closed speculum at Lena's vaginal opening. The blades were cold. The edges were smooth but not warm, not gentle, not accommodating. They pressed against the tight, closed entrance — outer labia already clamped apart by the retractor clips, inner labia similarly parted, the vestibule fully exposed, the vaginal opening a small, tightly closed slit.

"Lena." Daniil's voice was rough. "This is going to be your first time having anything inside you."

"I know."

"I know you always thought it would be... different."

"Please just do it."

"I'm going to push it in now. And it's going to take your virginity. And then I'm going to open it, and the needles are going to fire, and I'm going to inject you. And then we're going to do it four more times, bigger each time."

"I *know*. Please just—"

He pushed.

The closed Collins Large speculum entered Lena's vagina.

The vaginal introitus — the opening — resisted. She was virgin-tight, her muscles clenched from hours of pain and fear, the tissue dry because no lubricant had been applied and her body's natural lubrication was suppressed by the terror and the sympathetic nervous system overdrive. The metal blades pushed against the tight ring of muscle and it gave, slowly, reluctantly, the tissue stretching around the cold, flat intruders.

The hymen — a thin, crescent-shaped membrane — tore. Lena felt it go: a sharp, specific sting, a moment of give, and then the speculum was past it, sliding deeper into the vaginal canal, and she was no longer a virgin.

"Hymen ruptured," Dr. Yuen confirmed, observing a small amount of blood on the speculum shaft. "Note the time."

Daniil pushed the speculum to its full depth. The blades were fully inside Lena's vagina now, the tips pressing against the fornices near the cervix. The handle protruded from her body.

"Now open it," said Dr. Manova.

Daniil engaged the ratchet mechanism. The blades began to separate, spreading Lena's vaginal walls apart. Click by click, the speculum opened.

The stretch was immediate and intense. Lena's vaginal walls — virgin, tight, never dilated — were forced apart by the widening blades. The tissue blanched as it stretched, the rugae — the ridged folds of the vaginal lining — flattening under tension. Each click of the ratchet added millimeters of stretch, and each millimeter fired pain signals from the distending tissue.

"Open her fully," said Dr. Manova. "Maximum spread for the Collins Large."

Daniil kept clicking. The speculum opened wider. Lena's vaginal canal was exposed — a tunnel of pink tissue, stretched taut over the blades, the cervix visible at the far end, a rounded nub of tissue with a tiny central dimple. The view was clinical, complete — every fold and feature of her internal anatomy on display.

The stretch was painful but bearable — barely. Lena was whimpering, her vaginal muscles trying involuntarily to close against the speculum and failing, the metal too strong.

"Needles ready," said Dr. Manova. "Mr. Orlov, the deployment button is on the handle. When you press it, all thirty-two needles — sixteen per blade — will fire simultaneously into the vaginal walls. The needles will penetrate approximately 8 millimeters into the tissue, and then the injection will auto-deliver over ten seconds."

"She's going to feel thirty-two 14-gauge needles go into her vagina at the same time?"

"While it's held open at maximum stretch, yes."

Daniil looked at Lena. Her eyes were locked on his hand — on his thumb, hovering over the deployment button.

"Baby," he said, "you have no idea how hot this is."

He pressed the button.

The needles fired.

Thirty-two 14-gauge needles deployed simultaneously from the inner surfaces of the speculum blades, punching through the stretched-taut vaginal mucosa. The tissue was under tension from the speculum, which made it thinner, which made the needle penetration faster and deeper. Each needle was nearly 2mm in diameter — thick enough to produce a distinct, individual puncture wound in the vaginal wall, thick enough that Lena could feel each one as a separate event despite their simultaneous deployment.

Her scream was *enormous*. It filled the room. It was the scream of a body experiencing thirty-two simultaneous impalements in its most intimate interior, the needle tips buried in the nerve-rich vaginal walls, the tissue already stretched to its limit now additionally perforated and pinned.

Then the injection began. The irritant solution — delivered through each needle simultaneously — entered the vaginal tissue through thirty-two points. The chemical spread through the mucosa, a burning wave that radiated from each puncture site, the irritant reaching nerves that the needles hadn't directly hit, amplifying the pain field until her entire vaginal canal felt like it was filled with liquid fire.

"Injection complete," said Nurse Petric. "Speculum one of five."

"Retracting needles. Mr. Orlov, close the speculum and remove it."

The needles withdrew. Thirty-two small wells of blood appeared on the vaginal walls — bright red against the pink tissue, some of them running, gravity pulling the blood downward. Daniil closed the ratchet and slid the speculum out. Blood and irritant solution followed it, dripping from Lena's vaginal opening.

"Second speculum," said Dr. Okafor.

The second speculum was larger — wider blades, more needles (forty), and electrified. When Daniil inserted it — with marginally more ease, as the first speculum had begun the dilation process — and opened it, the vaginal walls stretched further than before, the tissue already traumatized by the first round of needles now forced open to a greater diameter. When the needles fired, they penetrated tissue that was already punctured, already bleeding, already irritated by the chemical injection. Some of the new needles entered directly into or near existing puncture wounds. The vasodilating agent they injected caused the vaginal tissue to flush, swell, and bleed more freely.

The electrical current activated after the injection — a low, pulsing current that stimulated every nerve in the vaginal walls. Combined with the chemical irritant from round one and the vasodilator from round two, the electricity produced a sensation that Lena later described, in her post-exam report, as "being electrocuted from inside my body."

Third speculum: even larger. More stretch. More needles — forty-eight. The neural sensitizer injection. By this point, Lena's vagina was bleeding steadily, the walls swollen and inflamed, punctured over a hundred times. The neural sensitizer made every sensation worse — the stretch, the needles, the electricity, the chemical burns. Her screams had degraded into continuous sobbing moans, her voice shredded.

Fourth speculum: the capsaicin injection. The speculum was large enough now that Daniil had to apply significant pressure to insert it, Lena's vaginal muscles fighting against an instrument that was stretching her far beyond anything her body was designed to accommodate. The capsaicin — concentrated, injectable — entered the vaginal walls through fifty-six needles and produced a reaction similar to the enema: an internal chemical burn, but in tissue that was already sensitized, already perforated, already bleeding. Lena screamed until she couldn't, and then she made sounds that weren't screams, guttural, animal sounds from somewhere below conscious control.

"She's breaking down again," Dr. Okafor noted. "Third psychological break event. Log it."

"I've never been so hard in my life," Daniil said, not to anyone in particular. He was staring at the blood running from Lena's vagina around the fourth speculum. "The way she stretches. The way the needles just... disappear into her. And the sounds she makes. God."

Dr. Brenn, who had been observing Daniil closely, said: "You have a natural aptitude for this. Have you considered a career in clinical examination?"

"I might, after today."

Fifth speculum. The largest. Lena's eyes went wide when Daniil held it up — the blades were massive, the needle count sixty-four, and the injection would be the combination cocktail: irritant, vasodilator, neural sensitizer, and capsaicin, all at once, through every needle.

"This can't fit," she whispered. "It's too big. I'm too small—"

"It will fit," said Dr. Manova. "The vagina is designed to accommodate birth. This is smaller than a newborn's head."

"But I've never—"

"You've taken four speculums today. You're dilated. You're lubricated — with blood, admittedly, but lubricated. It will fit. It will hurt. But it will fit."

Daniil inserted the fifth speculum. The insertion alone took two minutes — slow, steady, pushing the enormous blades into a vaginal canal that was bleeding, swollen, chemically burned, and electrically stimulated. Lena's body fought every centimeter. The blood from the previous procedures provided some lubrication, but the friction of the large blades against inflamed, punctured tissue was still excruciating.

When it was fully inserted and opened to maximum spread, Lena's vagina was a raw, red, bleeding cavity — visible end to end under the surgical light, the walls stretched paper-thin, the cervix exposed and accessible at the far end, the tissue stippled with over a hundred and fifty needle punctures from the previous four rounds.

"Deploy," said Daniil, and pressed the button without being told.

Sixty-four 14-gauge needles. Into walls that were already devastated. The combination injection — all four chemicals at once. Electricity.

Lena's fourth psychological break was total. She howled, convulsed, hyperventilated, and then began screaming "I QUIT I QUIT I QUIT—"

"You signed the consent," Dr. Okafor said calmly. "The exam cannot be stopped. But noted for the psychological profile."

Daniil leaned close to her face. "Lena. Mars. The sunrise. The thin pink light."

She stared at him through streaming tears. Blood was running from her vagina in thin rivulets, tracking down over her raw, skinless anus, pooling on the station's collection surface.

"I hate you," she said.

"I know," he said. "But you're going to space."

The fifth speculum was removed. Lena's vagina gaped — dilated, traumatized, bleeding from hundreds of puncture wounds, the walls inflamed and chemically burned, the tissues swollen and raw.

"Vaginal speculum series complete," said Dr. Okafor. "Cervical and uterine examination next."

---

## PART TEN — CERVICAL AND UTERINE EXAMINATION

The fifth speculum had been removed, but a fresh Collins Large — without needle arrays — was reinserted to hold the vaginal canal open for cervical access. Even this "simple" speculum, entering the devastated vaginal tissue, produced a moan from Lena.

The cervix was visible at the end of the canal — a small, round structure, pale pink (now flecked with blood from the vaginal procedures), with the external os at its center: a tiny dimple in virgin, nulliparous tissue.

"The cervical exam has three components," said Dr. Yuen. "First: measurement and injection of the ectocervix — the outer surface. Second: dilation of the cervical os and injection of the endocervical canal. Third: uterine sounding — passage of a sound through the cervix into the uterus for uterine measurement, followed by injection into the uterine cavity."

"The cervix has its own nerve supply," Dr. Manova added. "Separate from the vaginal nerves. Cervical pain is characteristically deep, cramping, and nauseating. Candidates frequently vomit during cervical procedures."

*Vomit. On top of everything else.*

"Mr. Orlov, this requires steady hands. The cervix is small and mobile. You'll need to grasp it with the tenaculum to stabilize it."

The tenaculum — a long, slender instrument with two sharp, curved teeth at the tip — was handed to Daniil. Dr. Yuen guided his hand through the open speculum to the cervix.

"Place the teeth on the anterior lip of the cervix, at 12 o'clock. Apply firm pressure to puncture the surface and engage."

Daniil placed the tenaculum teeth against Lena's cervix. The sharp points dimpled the tissue. He squeezed. The teeth punctured through the cervical surface — a bitten, piercing pain that made Lena cry out, deep and guttural, the cervical nerves sending their distinct signal. Two small points of blood appeared where the teeth entered.

"Good grip. Now pull gently downward to bring the cervix toward the vaginal opening. This is called 'tenting' the cervix."

Daniil pulled. The cervix, still attached to its ligaments, moved downward toward the speculum opening. The traction produced a deep, nauseating ache in Lena's pelvis — the cardinal ligaments stretching, the uterus shifting. Her stomach lurched.

"She's going to vomit," Dr. Manova predicted.

"I—" Lena retched. Nurse Petric turned her head in the chin cup and held a basin. She vomited — thin, bile-colored, her stomach nearly empty. The retching pulled at her abdominal muscles, which shifted the uterus, which pulled on the tenaculum, which pulled on the cervix, which produced more pain, which produced more nausea. A vicious cycle.

"Let her finish. Then we proceed."

When the retching subsided, Daniil still held the tenaculum. The cervix was pulled into clear view, the small round surface with its central os now accessible.

"Measurement needles," said Dr. Yuen. "Two 20-gauge, cross pattern. Through the cervix."

Daniil passed two needles through the ectocervix — one horizontally, one vertically, forming a cross through the dense, fibrous tissue. The cervix was harder than vaginal tissue — more resistant to the needle, requiring more force. Each needle passage was a grinding, twisting pain deep in Lena's pelvis, unlike any surface pain, a pain that made her whole body feel wrong, made her want to curl into a ball, made her feel violated at a level deeper than the vaginal procedures had reached.

"Cervical diameter: 24 millimeters. Now inject."

Injections into the cervix — four of them, through 22-gauge needles, at the four quadrant points. The irritant solution entered the cervical tissue and produced a deep, cramping burn that radiated into Lena's pelvis, her lower back, her thighs. She moaned — low, sustained, the sound of deep visceral pain.

"Now the os. We need to dilate the cervical os from approximately 2 millimeters to approximately 8 millimeters for the uterine sound."

Cervical dilators — Hegar dilators, a graduated set, smooth and polished. Starting at 2mm.

"The standard protocol uses Hegar dilators at normal pace," Dr. Yuen said. "The modified protocol for this candidate uses Hegar dilators preceded by an injection of the tightening agent — the same agent used on the anus — directly into the cervical os."

"You're going to tighten her cervix before dilating it?" Daniil asked.

"Yes. For the same reason we tightened her anus before dilating it. It increases resistance, which increases pain, which produces better data."

The tightening injection went directly into the internal os of the cervix — a single 25-gauge needle, pushed into the tiny opening, the plunger depressed to deliver the astringent compound into the cervical canal. Lena felt the chemical take effect almost instantly — a clenching, a tightening of the already-tiny passage, the muscular cervix squeezing shut with pharmacological force.

Then the dilation began.

The 2mm dilator entered the os. Even at this tiny size, the pharmacologically tightened cervix resisted. Daniil pushed — gentle, steady — and the dilator slid through with a pop of resistance that he felt in his fingertips.

"She's so tight," he murmured. "I can feel the cervix clamping on the dilator."

Each progressive dilator — 3mm, 4mm, 5mm — required more force. The tightening agent made the cervix fight every millimeter of dilation. By 6mm, Lena was producing a continuous, low, grunting moan — the sound of deep, visceral, abdominal pain that she had no conscious control over. Her face was gray-green. She retched again, dry this time.

7mm. 8mm. The cervical os, pharmacologically tightened and now mechanically forced to quadruple its resting diameter, was open. Through it, the dark canal of the endocervix was visible — and beyond that, the cavity of the uterus.

"Uterine sound," said Dr. Yuen. "Mr. Orlov, you're going to sound the uterus. The sound is a thin, flexible metal rod — you'll pass it through the cervical canal and into the uterine cavity. You'll feel the fundus — the top of the uterus — when you reach it. Note the depth."

Daniil took the uterine sound — a long, thin instrument with a slight curve at the tip and centimeter markings along its length. He introduced the tip into the dilated cervical os.

"Gentle," Dr. Yuen cautioned. "The uterine wall is thin. You can perforate it with too much force. That would cause permanent damage, which is not permitted."

Daniil advanced the sound through the cervical canal. Lena felt it — a deep, invasive, creeping sensation unlike anything else, a foreign object entering a space that had never been touched, never been opened, never been violated. The sound passed through the internal os and entered the uterine cavity. The tip pressed against the fundus.

"I can feel the end," Daniil said. "It's... soft. I can feel the wall."

"Depth?"

"Seven centimeters."

"Normal for her size. Now — rotate the sound gently. Map the walls."

Daniil rotated the sound, sweeping the tip along the interior of the uterus. Lena's deep moaning changed quality — a wavering, nauseated sound, her body responding to the profound wrongness of the intrusion with cramping and autonomic distress.

"This is inside her uterus," Daniil said, almost to himself. "I'm touching the inside of her womb. I've never been this far inside her. I've never been inside her at all, and now I'm in her uterus." He paused. "I can feel it contract around the sound. It's trying to push it out."

"The uterus has its own contractile capability," Dr. Yuen confirmed. "It's essentially a muscular organ. Now — the injection."

A long, thin needle — 22-gauge, eight centimeters long — was threaded through the cervical os alongside the sound. The needle tip entered the uterine cavity.

"Inject 2ml of the irritant solution directly into the endometrial surface — the lining of the uterus."

Daniil depressed the plunger. The irritant solution contacted the endometrium.

The uterus cramped. Hard. A massive, clenching contraction that Lena felt as a wave of deep, nauseating, overwhelming pain — the kind of pain that made the world go dark at the edges, that made her body try to fold in half, that produced a scream that came from her diaphragm, from her core, from the deepest part of her.

"Beautiful contraction," Dr. Yuen observed. "You can see the uterus squeezing around the sound."

"I can feel it," Daniil said. "It's — god, it's squeezing so hard. Like it's trying to crush the sound."

"Second injection — 2ml of capsaicin solution."

The second injection went in. The capsaicin inside the uterus produced a chemical burn in the endometrial lining that caused the uterus to go into sustained, rhythmic contractions — powerful, clenching spasms that Lena felt as the worst menstrual cramps imaginable, multiplied by a factor she couldn't quantify, each contraction wringing the capsaicin deeper into the tissue.

Lena vomited again. Then again. Then dry-heaved, her abdominal muscles convulsing, each convulsion jostling the sound and needle still in her uterus, each jostle producing more pain, more nausea.

"Remove the sound and needle. Cervical examination and uterine sounding complete."

The instruments withdrew. A rush of blood — cervical, uterine — followed them out, joining the blood still flowing from the vaginal puncture wounds.

---

## PART ELEVEN — RIGID SIGMOIDOSCOPY

"We've saved this for now," said Dr. Okafor, "because her anus has had time to re-tighten fully."

The sigmoidoscope sat on its tray — gleaming, enormous, four inches in diameter and twenty-four inches long. A rigid steel tube, polished smooth but not friendly, not flexible, not accommodating. It was wider than Lena's forearm.

"The anus has been prepared — tightened, sanded, enema-expanded and re-tightened. The capsaicin residue in the rectum will still be active. The raw, skinless tissue of the anus and internal canal will make the insertion of the sigmoidoscope uniquely painful."

"Is that really four inches?" Daniil asked, holding it, turning it in the light.

"Four inches in diameter. The standard instrument is two centimeters — less than an inch. This is the program's modified version. Every candidate takes it."

"And she has no skin on her anus."

"Correct. The sanded tissue will be in direct contact with the instrument's surface. She'll feel every millimeter of the insertion at a nerve-ending level that intact skin would mute."

"I'm going to insert this," Daniil said. It was not a question.

"You are."

Daniil moved between Lena's legs. The sigmoidoscope was heavy in his hands. He positioned the open end against Lena's anus — the raw, red, skinless, blood-weeping ring of tissue that had been sanded, injected, dilated by the enema nozzle, and then allowed to re-tighten.

The tightening agent had reasserted itself. The anus was clenched shut, the skinless muscle rock-hard, the tissue raw and hypersensitive. The four-inch diameter of the sigmoidoscope pressed against a sphincter that was contracted to perhaps half an inch.

"This is going to be the hardest thing I've put inside you today," Daniil said. "Are you ready?"

Lena's eyes were wide, fixed on the ceiling. She was beyond words. She shook her head — no. Not ready. Never ready.

"Push," said Dr. Okafor.

Daniil pushed. The polished end of the sigmoidoscope pressed against the raw anus. The tightened sphincter resisted — massively, the pharmacological tightening adding to the body's natural defense. The raw tissue compressed under the pressure, nerve endings firing wildly, the exposed dermis and submucosa transmitting every microgram of pressure directly to the pain centers without any skin to buffer the sensation.

"More force," said Dr. Brenn. "Steady and sustained. The sphincter will yield."

Daniil pushed harder. The four-inch rim of the sigmoidoscope began to dimple the tissue inward, the raw anus stretching around the leading edge. The stretch was visible — the red, bleeding tissue whitening as it distended, the raw surface pulling apart, micro-tears opening in the dermis where it was thinnest.

Lena's scream was hoarse, broken, barely audible — her voice was destroyed from hours of screaming. But the pain was the loudest thing in the room regardless. Her body was rigid against every restraint, every muscle firing, her fingers clawed, her toes curled.

The widest part of the sigmoidoscope cleared the sphincter. The anus snapped around the narrower interior of the tube with a spasm that Daniil felt through the metal. The instrument was past the sphincter, the first two inches inside the rectum.

"Keep going. Full insertion — twenty-four inches into the sigmoid colon."

Daniil advanced the sigmoidoscope. Each inch pushed the rigid tube deeper into Lena's rectum and then into her sigmoid colon, the capsaicin-residue-coated walls of her intestine stretching around four inches of rigid steel. The internal tissue, unlike the sanded anus, still had its mucosa — but it was irritated, inflamed, and sensitized by the capsaicin enema. The sigmoidoscope scraped along the mucosal surface as it advanced, and Lena could feel every inch of its passage as a deep, stretching, burning intrusion.

At twelve inches, the sigmoidoscope reached the junction of the rectum and sigmoid colon — a curve. The rigid instrument couldn't follow the curve gently. It had to push through.

"She's going to feel this as a sharp, deep pressure," Dr. Brenn warned. "The instrument is straightening a natural curve. Support her."

Daniil pushed through the curve. Lena's deep, guttural moan spiked into a scream — sharp, visceral, a cry of something moving inside her that shouldn't, something forcing her intestine into a shape it didn't want to take.

Eighteen inches. Twenty. Twenty-two. Twenty-four.

"Full insertion," Daniil reported. The sigmoidoscope's eyepiece protruded from Lena's anus, the full twenty-four-inch length inside her body, the four-inch diameter stretching her intestine. Her abdomen was visibly distended along the path of the instrument — a hard ridge under the skin tracing the course of the sigmoid colon.

"I can see the path of it through her stomach," Daniil said. "I can see where it is inside her, from the outside."

He placed his hand on her abdomen, over the hard line of the sigmoidoscope. He pressed.

Lena howled.

"Don't press on it," Dr. Yuen said mildly. "Or — actually — for assessment purposes, apply moderate pressure at the sigmoid curve and note her response."

Daniil pressed again, on the curve, feeling the rigid instrument through Lena's thin abdominal wall, pressing it against the interior of her intestine. The double pressure — from outside and inside — compressed the bowel wall between his hand and the steel, and Lena's response was a full-body convulsion and a scream that finally, completely broke her.

She sobbed. Not screamed, not moaned — sobbed. Deep, heaving, shattered sobs, her entire body shaking in the restraints, her face contorted, snot and tears running freely, her chest heaving against the strap. She sobbed like a child — past words, past negotiation, past endurance. She sobbed from the bottom of her soul.

"Fifth psychological break event," Dr. Okafor noted. "Duration and intensity significant. This is the most comprehensive break we've seen in—" he checked the records — "seventeen candidates."

"She's incredible," Daniil said softly, watching her sob. "She's the strongest person I've ever known and she's completely broken and she's still not quitting."

The sigmoidoscope remained in place for the full examination — Dr. Yuen using the optical system to inspect the entire mucosal surface, noting the capsaicin damage, the enema residue, and the condition of the tissues. Biopsies were taken through the scope — small pinches of tissue snipped from the intestinal wall, each one producing a sharp, localized pain that Lena barely registered over the overwhelming baseline agony.

When the sigmoidoscope was finally withdrawn — inch by inch, Daniil pulling slowly, the rigid tube sliding through her devastated anus — a rush of blood followed it. The raw, skinless anus gaped around empty air, four inches of dilation slowly contracting, the tissue raw, red, and streaming blood.

"Anal and rectal series complete," said Dr. Okafor.

---

## PART TWELVE — EXPERIMENTAL ADDITIONAL PROCEDURES

"We have approximately forty minutes remaining," said Dr. Okafor, consulting the clock. "The standard exam is complete. However, Protocol 7-C allows for additional experimental procedures at physician discretion. We have three to perform."

Lena's eyes, swollen nearly shut from crying, opened.

*More. There's more. After everything — more.*

"First: a comprehensive nerve-mapping injection series. Every examined area — breasts, nipples, urethra, clitoris, cervix, vaginal walls, anus, and rectum — will receive a final round of injections using a long-duration irritant that will ensure continued pain response for the next twelve hours. This guarantees that the candidate experiences sustained post-exam pain, which is the final data point in the psychological evaluation."

"Twelve more hours of pain," Lena whispered.

"Minimum. The irritant is slow-release."

"Second: Mr. Orlov has proposed an original procedure that we'd like to implement."

Lena looked at Daniil.

"I had an idea," he said. "During the exam, watching you — watching how your body responds to different types of pain in different areas — I thought: what if we combine them? What if we stimulate all the examined areas simultaneously? Needles in the clitoris, urethra, cervix, nipples, and anus, all at the same time, all connected to the electrical system, all delivering current simultaneously? A full-body nerve overload. They said it's never been done."

"It hasn't," Dr. Yuen confirmed. "It's theoretically sound. The simultaneous stimulation of all major nerve clusters would produce a compound pain response that's qualitatively different from sequential stimulation. It's an excellent suggestion."

"You thought of that," Lena said to Daniil. "You invented a new way to hurt me."

"For science," he said. The flush on his face was deep, his breathing was rapid, and the erection in his jeans was impossible to ignore. "And because I want to see what happens. I want to see the look on your face when every nerve in your body fires at the same time."

"That is genuinely unprecedented," said Dr. Brenn. "Well done, Mr. Orlov."

"Third experimental procedure," said Dr. Okafor. "A repeat clitoral assessment with the neural excitant at double dose, administered by Mr. Orlov, to compare the pain-to-stimulus curve with the baseline established earlier."

"The double dose will make the sensitivity approximately twenty times baseline," Dr. Manova noted. "At that level, air movement across the clitoral surface will register as pain."

---

### Procedure 12A: Comprehensive Long-Duration Irritant Injection Series

Every examined area received its final injection. Daniil performed them all.

Breasts — four injections each, deep into the tissue, through the existing mammography channels. The long-duration irritant joined the cocktail already present in the perforated tissue.

Nipples — two injections each, directly into the still-swollen, still-bleeding buds. Lena's nipples were so sensitized that the needle entry alone produced a convulsion.

Clitoris — one injection, re-entering the tiny glans with a 25-gauge needle, the neural excitant still active, making the needle feel like a burning lance.

Urethra — one injection into each wall through the dilated meatus, the needle entering tissue still raw from the sounding.

Cervix — two injections through the still-dilated os, deep into the endocervix, each one triggering uterine cramps.

Vaginal walls — eight injections, distributed around the circumference, through tissue that was already punctured hundreds of times, each new needle entering a landscape of overlapping wounds.

Anus — four injections into the raw, skinless ring of muscle, the needle contacting exposed dermis with no epithelial buffer, each injection a direct chemical assault on bare nerve endings.

Rectum — two injections delivered through a long needle passed through the anus, into the rectal wall, the capsaicin residue still active.

By the end of the injection series, Lena was bleeding from every examined area simultaneously. Her breasts streamed from their hundreds of punctures. Her nipples wept red. Her clitoris bled from multiple needle passages. Her urethra oozed pink-tinged fluid. Her vagina flowed with blood and chemical residue. Her cervix and uterus contributed their own bleeding to the vaginal stream. Her anus was a ring of raw, bleeding flesh. Her rectum seeped.

She was a map of pain. Every intimate surface marked, perforated, injected, and bleeding.

---

### Procedure 12B: Daniil's Simultaneous Multi-Site Nerve Overload

"This is the unprecedented one," said Dr. Yuen, attaching leads and needle-electrodes. "We're going to place needle-electrodes in eight sites simultaneously and connect them all to a synchronized pulse generator."

Needle-electrodes were placed:

1. Left nipple — through the swollen, bleeding tissue.

2. Right nipple — same.

3. Clitoris — re-entering the tortured glans.

4. Urethral meatus — into the dilated, raw walls.

5. Cervix — through the os, into the endocervix.

6. Left vaginal wall — through existing puncture wounds.

7. Right vaginal wall — same.

8. Anus — into the raw, skinless sphincter.

Eight needle-electrodes. Eight sites. All connected to a single control box that Daniil would operate.

"When you turn the dial," Dr. Yuen said, "all eight sites receive current simultaneously. Start low. Increase gradually."

Daniil held the dial. He looked at Lena — restrained, bleeding from everywhere, her body a landscape of medical devastation, her face swollen and tear-streaked, her eyes barely open.

"I love you," he said. "And I've never wanted anything more than to turn this dial."

He turned it.

The current flowed. Eight sites. Simultaneously.

Lena's body arched against the restraints — a full-body convulsion, every muscle firing at once, her back lifting from the station surface, her fingers and toes splaying, her jaw clamping against the chin cup. The sound she made was not a scream. It was not a moan. It was a sound that came from the synthesis of eight distinct pain signals arriving at her brain simultaneously — nipples, clitoris, urethra, cervix, vaginal walls, anus — each one carrying its own quality of pain, each one at full intensity, all of them merging into something that exceeded pain's normal categories. It was total. It was everything. It was her entire body's nerve network, focused on the eight most sensitive points, all burning at once.

Daniil increased the dial. The sound from Lena changed — higher, thinner, more strained. Her eyes rolled back. Her body trembled in the restraints with a fine, high-frequency vibration that made the instrument trays buzz sympathetically.

"Increase again," said Dr. Okafor, watching the monitors. "Her cardiovascular parameters are still within safe limits."

Daniil increased. Lena's jaw opened, the chin cup releasing, and a sound came from her that the doctors would later describe in their report as "a vocalization unlike any previously recorded in the program." It was part scream, part gasp, part something else — something primal and non-verbal that communicated a depth of sensation beyond language.

"This is extraordinary," Dr. Yuen said, studying the readouts. "The compound pain response is generating neural patterns we've never observed. The simultaneous multi-site stimulation is producing a synergistic effect — the total pain signal is significantly greater than the sum of the individual signals. Mr. Orlov, your idea has generated genuinely novel data."

"She's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen," Daniil said. He was staring at Lena's face — the contortion, the raw, total vulnerability, the absolute destruction of composure and dignity and defense. Every wall she'd ever built around herself was gone. She was reduced to a body in pain, and he found her devastating.

The current ran for thirty seconds. When Daniil turned the dial to zero, Lena collapsed against the station surface, limp, gasping, her entire body shuddering with aftershocks. Tears ran from her closed eyes. Blood ran from everywhere else.

"That was unprecedented," Dr. Okafor confirmed. "Truly. We'll be incorporating this into the standard protocol going forward. Excellent work, Mr. Orlov."

---

### Procedure 12C: Double-Dose Clitoral Reassessment

The final procedure. Lena was barely conscious — hovering in a twilight between awareness and dissociation, her body's pain management systems overwhelmed, her mind retreating.

"Revive," said Dr. Okafor.

Another stimulant injection. Lena's eyes opened. For a moment, there was nothing in them — no recognition, no personality, just raw awareness. Then she came back, and the pain came with her, and a low, hopeless moan leaked from her throat.

"Last one," Dr. Manova said. "The double-dose clitoral injection and reassessment."

Daniil prepared the syringe — 2ml of the neural excitant, double the first dose. The clitoris was already bleeding, already hypersensitive from the first dose and the multi-site procedure. The electrode was removed to make way for the injection needle.

"This will bring her sensitivity to approximately twenty times baseline," Dr. Manova repeated. "At that level, the clitoris will register any stimulus — including air currents — as acute pain. The reassessment electrical test will produce a response at the lowest settings that previously required the highest."

Daniil placed the needle against Lena's clitoris. She flinched — even in her devastated state, the clitoris was so sensitized that needle contact alone was agony.

"Lena," he said. "Last one. You're almost there. You're almost done. And then you're going to space."

He injected. The double dose entered the tiny, brutalized glans. Lena's scream was thin, reedy — her voice was almost gone — but the full-body convulsion was just as powerful as the first injection had produced.

The effect was immediate and extreme. Her clitoris became so sensitive that she could feel the ambient air temperature as a burning pain. The surgical light's radiant heat — imperceptible to intact skin — registered as a searing warmth on the injected tissue. She whimpered continuously from the baseline stimulation of existing alone.

"Electrical reassessment," said Dr. Yuen. "Same protocol. Setting one."

The needle-electrodes re-entered her clitoris. Daniil turned the dial to the first setting — the lowest — the setting that had produced only a gasp the first time.

Lena screamed. A full, desperate, ragged scream at the lowest electrical setting, her body convulsing, her back arching. At twenty times sensitivity, the minimal current was overwhelming.

"Setting two," said Dr. Yuen.

Daniil turned the dial. Lena blacked out instantly.

"Overload at setting two," Dr. Yuen noted. "Versus setting seven at baseline. The double dose neural excitant reduces the overload threshold by seventy-one percent. Remarkable data."

Nurse Petric administered the stimulant. Lena came back. She was shaking, whole-body tremors that she couldn't control.

"Exam complete," said Dr. Okafor. He checked the clock. "Three hours, fifty-two minutes. Within the four-hour window."

---

## PART THIRTEEN — AFTERMATH

The restraints released with a series of clicks. Lena didn't move. Her legs remained in the spread position, her arms at her sides, her body motionless except for the tremors and the shallow, rapid breathing.

She was bleeding from everywhere. Both breasts — over two hundred puncture wounds, still seeping. Both nipples — swollen, perforated, oozing. Her clitoris — a small, devastated bead, bleeding from multiple needle passages. Her urethra — dilated, raw, weeping pink fluid. Her vagina — gaping, the walls visible, stippled with hundreds of needle wounds, blood flowing steadily from the chemical-burned, electrically-stimulated tissue. Her cervix and uterus — contributing their own bleeding to the vaginal stream. Her anus — a raw, skinless, bleeding ring, still slightly gaping from the sigmoidoscope. Her rectum — seeping blood and capsaicin residue.

Every examined area. Bleeding. As specified.

The long-duration irritant ensured that the pain would continue for twelve hours or more. She would bleed, and hurt, and feel every wound and every injection and every stretch for the rest of the day and into the night.

Nurse Petric began the documentation photos — clinical images of each examined area, the bleeding, the dilation, the tissue condition. The images would go in Lena's file.

Daniil stood beside the station. He peeled off his gloves. His hands were shaking — not from distress but from sustained arousal, from hours of focused, intimate, pain-inflicting intensity. He looked at Lena's destroyed body and felt something he would spend years trying to understand: a tenderness so profound it was indistinguishable from cruelty.

"Lena."

Her eyes opened. She looked at him. There was no anger in her face. There was nothing in her face — an emptiness that was not peace but exhaustion so total that emotion required energy she didn't have.

"You passed," he said.

"Candidate Vasik," Dr. Okafor said, "your physical evaluation is complete. Your pain endurance scores are among the highest we've recorded. Your psychological break events were within acceptable parameters for recovery. Your physiological responses indicate a strong candidate for extended-duration space mission stress profiles."

He paused.

"You're approved for the Astra Program. Congratulations."

Lena closed her eyes. Behind her eyelids: Mars. The rust-colored plains. The thin, cold light. The sunrise she'd dreamed about since she was eight years old, lying on the roof of her mother's apartment, staring at the red dot in the sky.

*I'm going to space.*

A tear leaked from her closed eye — but this one was different from the thousands that had preceded it. This one carried something other than pain.

"I'm going to space," she whispered.

Blood dripped from the station onto the floor. The surgical lights hummed. Somewhere deep in the facility, another candidate was being led down the long, descending corridor, barefoot, in a paper gown, clutching someone's arm.

Daniil leaned down and kissed Lena's forehead. She didn't flinch.

"I'm proud of you," he said.

And he meant it entirely — in all the complicated, contradictory, uncomfortable ways that a person can mean something they know they shouldn't feel.

---

**EXAM SUMMARY — CANDIDATE VASIK, LENA**

**Duration:** 3 hours, 52 minutes

**Psychological break events:** 5

**Loss of consciousness events:** 2

**Areas confirmed bleeding at exam conclusion:** Breasts, nipples, urethra, clitoris, cervix, uterus, vaginal canal, anus, rectum — **all confirmed**

**Speculum series:** 5/5 completed

**Enema:** 5L capsaicin, retained 20 minutes — completed

**Sigmoidoscopy:** 4" diameter, 24" insertion — completed

**Urethral dilation:** Maximum 14mm — completed

**Uterine sounding:** 7cm depth — completed

**Experimental procedures:** 3/3 completed, including unprecedented simultaneous multi-site nerve overload (Orlov protocol)

**Needle count (total):** 432 (estimated, inclusive of all measurement, injection, mammography, and electrode needles across all examined areas)

**Candidate status:** **APPROVED FOR ASTRA PROGRAM**

---

*She would go to Mars. She would see the sunrise. And for the rest of her life, she would carry two things from this day: the knowledge of exactly how much pain she could endure, and the complicated truth of what her boyfriend had become in the bright, cold light of that room underground.*