Han took Winter's hand and pulled her forward with him. "We'll go next," he volunteered. "Don't worry, I've got you," he whispered to Winter, who nodded shyly in agreement.
She stepped delicately out of her heels and knelt opposite Han.
I'm gonna fight 'em off. A seven nation army couldn't hold me back." Arrie played a booming battle song, winking at Winter in encouragement.
Winter pushed her shoulders back. She could do this! She looked across at Han.
Stripped down to his boxers, he was boyishly handsome with a ridiculously good body. Big shoulders, biceps and pec's, but not too big. He looked like a swimmer or a tennis player, not a body builder. Winter tried not to stare, though she was sure the other girls were all ogling him. He had a heavy brow with thick dark eyebrows and tousled black hair, a square jaw and eyes that hailed from the old East, matching his name.
Before Winter could even move, he leapt forward and swept her to the mats, pinning her under him. Her bikini was pulled free and gone before she could even grip it in self-defence, then he pulled her dress down around her waist, spinning her to face him and pressing her to his chest so no one could see her breasts.
He tried not to look down, knowing that they were squished against his torso. He did not want to end up in the embarrassing predicament Wolf had landed himself in. He left a little strip of her dress across her ass to preserve her modesty.
"Do you concede defeat?" he asked her.
"I concede! I concede!" she squeaked.
He pulled her dress back up for her, and she breathed a sigh of relief.
"Thank you, Han. That was much better than I was expecting. What's my punishment?" she said, eager to get it over and done with.
"Will you do one of your dancey, gym-thing routines for us?" he asked.
Winter nodded enthusiastically. This was easy!
Arrie put on a fast-paced pop song song whose chorus sang 'I'm levitating, the milky way, we're renegading, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.' Winter cleared a space on the mats, pulling her long hair up in a she-means-business ponytail and slipping back into her bikini bottoms to make sure she didn't inadvertently flash anyone.
Then, boom! The little dynamo did a sprint run-up, hurdle, round-off, then hit a back-in, full-out trick, where two back somersaults end with a full twist during the second somersault.
The guards' mouths dropped open.
"What the fuck was that?" said Niko. "Did everyone see that?" he looked around at his mates.
Now she performed some balletic turns on her toes, then into a double front walkover, landing in the splits.
The men cheered and clapped.
She rolled from the splits into a difficult press-to-handstand trick, holding it at a planche, where her body was held parallel to the floor, then up to a full handstand where she pirouetted on her hands, kicking out of it into a cartwheel, then a front handspring, finishing with a double stag ring leap where her back was arched, and her back foot was touching her head.
She did the gymnasts' salute, and the men all stood and clapped in appreciation.
"Amazing!" said the commander. "You're very talented Winter."
"That was incredible Winter," said Han.
"Thank you," she said. "I'm not as good as Arrie, you should see what she can do. And Ruby's very good too."
"That's what you get when you train six days a week, four hours a day," said Delphi. "All thanks to our Lord's desires for his women. Still, we're thankful for the martial arts, fencing and archery. It wasn't all a complete waste of time."
That put a dampener on the boys' praises…
"Any other takers for a public wrestling match?" asked the commander.
"We should do it Baer?" said Loveday hopefully.
"Definitely not," he said. "I have a score to settle with you missy, in private."
Loveday looked apprehensive. She knew he wasn't planning to let her off lightly.
Arrie felt a pang of jealousy.
"Alright, private matches start now," said the commander. "No interruptions while I'm fighting, and punishing, Captain Chastain."
"Don't jump to conclusions," she grumbled.
"If you need an adjudicator, speak to any of the three pairs who have finished their match."
The commander grabbed Delphi by the hand and tried to pull her out of the room.
"Hold on," she said. "I just need to talk to the team before we fight."
The girls huddled around Delphi.
"Very good work Arrie, Winter and Ruby. Loveday, Indy, Feifei, remember you need to recruit your man. Lili, yours is done. Just keep him warm. Do what you have to do girls. Remember our training. That may or may not mean sex, depending on the man. You might need to keep him panting, you might need to be amazing in bed, you might get away with a head job or hand job. I know some of them are cute. Try to keep your emotions out of it. Especially you girls with the sweet boys, Winter, Ruby," she reminded them. "Alight, go get 'em!"
The girls did their secret handshake before parting.
The commander had gathered his men in a huddle too.
"Remember not to fall for these women, soldiers. I know they're all sexy as fuck and gorgeous to boot but follow our plan. Magnus, Han, especially you two with those sweet little girls. I know you're fantasising about marrying them. Cormac, same goes for you, except for the 'sweet little girl' part of the speech."
"What do you mean Commander?" said Cormac, affronted. "Lili's the sweetest little girl of all of them."
The commander shook his head, rolling his eyes. "You're deluded private. That girl's the wildest of the lot of them. But like I said, remember our plan."
He looked up and saw that the girls had finished their huddle. He wasn't planning to wait a second longer. He strode over with a fierce look in his eye and grabbed Delphi by the hand.
"I won't take no for an answer this time," he said, pulling her out of the training room while she walked reluctantly behind him, her arm at full stretch.