Special Forces: Soldiers Vashtan/Aleksandr Voinov and Marquesate

Vadim listened, and Dan’s sounds were driving him insane. He would have 

liked nothing more than drive himself into that shuddering, sweating, gleaming 

body that seemed so hot to the touch now, claim him completely, and pulled his 

lips from his teeth. Control just as fierce as need. Kept thinking of the intricate 

dance between Mark and Darren, the less Darren actually took for himself, the 

more Mark gave, begged, the more Mark was his – and wasn’t that a mystery that 

needed exploring? Forcing his fingers apart, sweat trickling from his forehead with 

denial and concentration, he put the fifth finger between them, and moved in again, 

the row of knuckles the main problem, and how to do it but just try and go ahead. It 

took forever, and part of him hoped he wouldn’t have to go that far, didn’t have to 

go to the limit, because his hard-on was already torture. 

Dan sobbed, let go of everything. Abandoned. Thoughts, pain, fear and 

madness. Pushing backwards in a slow continuous movement. Elegant, the way his 

 390 

body moved on its own, taking in that hand, accepting the fingers and moving 

steadily in the flow. Mindless, on instinct. 

Crying and sweating, trembling, he moaned and whimpered, lost in base 

desire and deepest need, no notion of what he should or could do, just a body that 

was nothing but centred sensations; a body that reacted at last. Pulled away from 

death and decay, Dan’s cock giving proof of life, almost flat against the stomach, 

foreskin retreating and dark purple head glistening with precum with every further 

breach of that hand through yielding muscle, deeper into his body. 

Vadim muttered tender insults, curses, his hand engulfed in that powerful 

heat, muscles closing his hand to form a fist, and he moved to kiss Dan’s back, lick 

the sweat from it, while offering resistance to the body that moved on instinct, the 

smallest motions, moving inside, against Dan in ways that surprised and amazed 

him, opening and closing that fist against the resistance. 

Dan pressed his head against the ground, arms wide as if spread-eagled, 

crucified by that fist inside his body and the unbearable intensity, yet he was 

craving more. Muscles in his body tensing-relaxing, one second steel hardened 

ropes, the other as loose as the tears flooding down his face. Unaware of any of his 

physical reaction, just one large surface of skin and feeling. 

Dan’s fists surreptitiously opened and clenched, as far stretched out from 

his body as possible, while his back arched to push his arse higher. Breathing fast 

now, yet deep, drawing air into his lungs. Alive, and he cried out for more. 

Senseless, pushing backwards, driving himself onto the fist that owned him. Took 

him, possessed him and allowed him to live in return. 

Vadim noticed the raging need and reached around Dan’s body, his own 

need killing him now, seeing Dan like this, hell, yes, just like Mark. Dan, who was 

so fierce about it, about his body, about the rape and just the thought of doing 

anything like this to him. Nothing like it, now, and not the cheap whore thing that 

Gavriil had done. Took the heavy cock and pumped it, slow, intense, hand also 

slicked up with the Vaseline, small movements inside, leisure strokes on the cock, 

he, himself, groaning with need, but unable to do anything about it but rub himself 

against the tensed leg, like a dog, whatever. Dan came within seconds, no more 

than a few strokes, and he crashed like never before in his life. His voice echoed 

across the mountains, swallowed by the rocks and the cold of the night as he 

screamed, losing himself. Thrashing, his whole body shuddering, flailing. Choking 

 391 

on tears and sounds, too much sensation. Intensity scalding, drilling into his core 

and bursting out with insane explosions of energy, pain, and life. Alive. So fucking 

alive that very moment, he had no name, no past, no future, and all he was, was a 

body, cumming, and nearly killing itself with its might. 

Dan collapsed. Out of his mind, but in his body. Trembling uncontrollably.  

Vadim pulled free when Dan lost it, another thing he’d learnt that strange 

night in London. Slowly, but firmly, his own need didn’t matter, he didn’t manage 

to get there, it didn’t matter, not right now. Wiped his hands on the ever-present, 

ever useful rag, moved Dan away from the wet patch, shifted his weight for him 

because Dan didn’t have enough control or focus now, judged by the way his body 

went slack, but in a good way. 

He covered Dan with a blanket, to keep the heat inside, then stood and 

walked off towards the mouth of the cave, checking if they had attracted any 

attention. Realised it must have taken hours, dawn was already approaching. Took 

a moment to finish himself off, thinking of Dan, naked, in this cave, fully his, and 

yielding, begging, asking for more, begging for his cock; willed his hand to be 

Dan’s throat, lips, forced himself to feel the heated breath against his groin, then, 

more violent, breaching that body, doing with his cock what his hand had done, ah, 

deeper, stronger, more powerful, and Dan pushing back, moaning and groaning 

and cumming. Vadim bit a curse down when he did, again wiped his hands, put the 

uniform in order. 

Then returned to share warmth, and nothing more. 

 

* * * 

 

Sleep. Darkness. No dreams, no voices nor rotting faces, no dead and torn 

limbs holding him down. Dan’s sleep was unconsciousness. Mercy. 

Warmth. Waking. He wasn’t sure if the darkness was inside him, behind or 

before his eyes, but he felt warmth and a touch, a close presence. Felt sore, too, a 

strange pain, but all he remembered was this focus, this something that had turned 

his body and mind into utter abandon, but what this ‘something’ was, he didn’t 

know. Knew nothing, barely his own name, just the source of heat in his back, the 

ache deep inside, and the feeling as if this ‘something’ was still inside of him, still 

protecting, connecting. 

 392 

Half-awake, Dan scrambled more than moved with any coherence, turned 

and rolled over onto the other side, curled up in a foetal position and burrowing 

into the heat. Closer. As close as he could, the memory of light, fire, and demon. 

Vadim was awake, felt Dan’s breath against his chest, shifted his legs to 

allow him to lie as close, and pushed a fold of the blanket back to make sure Dan 

was fully covered. Dan. Always him. Always, and again and again. This time, the 

Brit hadn’t even been there for his desire, was just a comrade, on a deeper, more 

fundamental level than Dima, Sershka, or Alyosha. Stronger than Platon, even 

though he sometimes missed the courageous little conscript. He did the numbers. 

Yes, indeed. Platon, had he lived, would now be home in Russia, with his 

girlfriend, if she had still wanted him back. He ran his fingers through Dan’s hair, 

carefully, checking that wound that had freaked him the first time he’d looked at it. 

The swelling was profound, the skin broken and discoloured. Something had hit 

him there with plenty of force.  

Had to hurt like a motherfucker. 

Dan twitched, his head jerking, moaned at a pain that was somewhere other 

than inside his body. Moved his head, craned his neck, so close to the other’s body, 

the heat was everywhere. “Don’t let them take me.” Whispered. Vadim gave a 

smile. “They’re all dead, Dan. You’re alive.” And thank whatever force for that. 

Blind chance. Destiny. The odd pattern of physics, too complex to calculate, but 

still a pattern which, sometimes, made things look intentional. 

Dan wasn’t awake, wasn’t quite there yet. Moved his head again to nuzzle 

his face into the other’s chest. His head hurt, while turning his hands that had been 

curled into fists. Palms out and against the other. Connection. 

“I need to check on your leg.”  

Dan just grunted something, no understanding what those words meant.  

Vadim had cleaned and bandaged the wound yesterday, but feared that last 

night’s exertions might have been not exactly what that leg needed. Felt oddly 

guilty, but at least he’d fulfilled the objective. Dan was no longer fighting and 

screaming his head off. 

He shifted, making sure Dan didn’t lose too much heat, and gave that 

wound a check-up, while Dan lay perfectly still, curled up and into himself. Letting 

himself be handled like a puppet. It looked like a flesh wound, the bullet had 

passed through, without doing any damage to bones. Would hurt, hurt plenty, but 

 393 

not incapacitate. Vadim bandaged it all up again, with dressings that he’d salvaged 

from a turkey and given to Dima, and Dima had shared his stock with him as well. 

Something to the end of it being too damn convenient if he died of gangrene. Dima 

was alright. 

Dan’s eyes remained closed, just breathing, was easier. Started to hurt like 

a motherfucker, head trying to explode from within, hammering against his skull, 

and his leg was on fire. Concentrated on another pain, that ache deep inside him, 

the soreness that was unfamiliar and kept reminding him of his sanity and saviour. 

Vadim dug into his thigh pocket and found the antibiotics, also from a 

turkey. Thank you, bitches, thought Vadim and offered the pills to Dan, reaching 

behind himself for the canteen. “Take these.” 

Dan opened his eyes, looked uncomprehending at the other’s hand. Dark, 

dark eyes, big, deep, just staring. Trying to get his head around what he had been 

asked to do. White things. Pills. Tablets. Take. 

Take. Swallow. 

Suddenly made sense. “Blowjob?” 

Vadim frowned. “Not...right now. Antibiotics. Gangrene’s a bitch, and 

that...” mass grave, “place I found you wasn’t exactly clean. Come on.” Opened 

the lips with his fingers, gentle, manoeuvred the pills onto the tongue, and offered 

the canteen, placing it against Dan’s lips and Dan swallowed. Lips Vadim had seen 

so often getting him off, lips that could just as easily sneer. Lips he’d kissed 

exactly once, and that mainly to muffle a scream and because no other touch would 

do. And what exactly could Dan do to fend him off? Nothing. He leaned in to 

touch Dan’s lips with his, felt the touch like a tingle, knew he should be pulling 

back, but pressed in closer, licked those lips, could taste the water on them and the 

dust and the misery and thought how very fucking fitting, the touch warm, no teeth 

now, no sneering. Shit. He wanted him, wanted him badly even in this state. 

Dan responded immediately. Lips seeking, hands palming at the other’s 

chest, wanting that touch, warmth, this softness. Something deep and tender, 

connecting straight through his centre, with the remaining sensations inside himself. 

Body and mind being one. 

Vadim pulled away. “I...need to scout the area. I should be back shortly.” 

Just a few hours. Allow the other to rest. 

 394 

“No!” Dan’s voice was low, but his hands scrabbling for the other. Bereft, 

alone. “Don’t leave me.” 

Vadim covered Dan’s hands with his and pressed them against his chest. “I 

won’t leave. I’m here. Sleep, Dan. Rest.” A bold-faced lie, he really needed to do 

some scouting, couldn’t have anybody walk in on them, not his side, not the other, 

nobody. 

Vadim wedged the open canteen between the bergans, checked his daypack 

and took the rifle, checked again on Dan, who had drifted off to sleep before he 

could realise Vadim was leaving. 

Sleep. Rest that his body and mind sorely needed. Dan slept for hours, the 

meds doing their job, his body in pain but his mind too exhausted to notice. 

 

* * * 

 

Vadim went back to the settlement; the mass grave clearly marked with a 

cloud of buzzing flies, and, most of all, the stench. He covered his face and did 

recce, thinking of Dan who waited up there in that mountain, but needed to take his 

time to be completely sure. 

His patience was rewarded when he found a body that had crawled away – 

tried to flee despite the wounds. The man was panting, soaked in blood, fingers 

turned into claws. Vadim turned him around, checked the face. To him, they all 

looked the same, beards, hawk noses, bony features, he was pretty sure he 

recognized the structure of the other’s teeth from the photo. The man was delirious 

with pain and exhaustion. He’d been responsible for killing Soviet prisoners of war, 

had organized and plotted, and fought, and was now just dying flesh in the sun. 

Vadim had no time to take prisoners, didn’t want to burden himself with yet 

another, and was pretty sure he was dying anyway. 

“Make your peace with Allah,” he muttered and pulled the pistol. He was 

exhausted, didn’t relish this the way he would have, like the country, the years of 

war had sapped his enthusiasm for it. He didn’t even hate the man anymore. All he 

really wanted to do was go back to Dan and make sure he was alright and would 

survive. 

He pressed the muzzle under the man’s jaw, made sure it was aligned to 

send the bullet straight up into the skull, then squeezed the trigger, and holstered 

 395 

the gun in the next moment. He stood, checked whether the shot had drawn any 

attention, but nothing. 

It was far away enough from the cave. They were safe. Stolen time, yet 

again. 

 

* * * 

 

When Vadim returned Dan had moved to the other side again, less pressure 

on the leg, and was curled up within the blankets, the canteen empty. Without 

waking, he had drunk the water, on instinct, then fallen back to sleep. Deep, 

regular breathing, unruly hair sticking out of the blankets and into his face. Not 

even twitching, nothing, just breathing. 

Vadim washed himself, then joined Dan on the blanket, moving his arms 

around the other, head to his shoulder, cradling the back of his head, one leg over 

his to pull him closer. He’d long lost any idea what this man was to him, only 

knew he had no words for it, no concept, lover didn’t quite fit it, even if it was 

technically true, comrade...wrong allegiance. And they weren’t friends.  He knew 

at least that much. “Rest up,” he muttered in Russian, and, mostly to keep himself 

awake, talked. Talked about Moscow, about the neighbours there, then 

remembered a story he had liked. The Firebird. He couldn’t tell a good story to 

save his life, but he had read that story to Anoushka back home. 

Dan was listening to the sound of that voice long before he realised he was 

waking. Began to make sense of words, sentences, the language that had become a 

second home to him. English. Russian. He almost felt more at home in the latter. 

Awareness returning into his body, and with it came pain. His head was 

pounding and his leg was in agony. But there was warmth, and closeness, arms that 

should feel restrictive but instead felt right. There. Around him and on him, close 

to him, and he lay still. Listening to the voice and tales of folklore and stories, 

while trying to make sense of the sensations in his body. 

Remembered blood, death and decay, horror. A shot, his leg, then 

something against his head. Pain, injuries. After that? Nothing. Shadowy figures 

and movements, then tears and terror, but something there to protect and focus, 

keeping the horror away. Rotten stench and putrefied bodies, the memory pushed 

away, not allowed back at the surface. 

 396 

Soreness. Could feel a sensation inside his body he’d never felt before. 

Stretched. Entered. Taken and used and oh so filled and centred and one with 

something...he just didn’t know what. 

Finally awake, Dan was slowly trying to make sense of it all, checking his 

body and mind, seemed he had lost many hours. “My arse hurts.” Astonished at the 

sound of his own voice, the croaked words of a stranger. Brittle, abused. 

Vadim placed a kiss on that forehead, much like he would kiss Anoushka, 

and nodded. “Yes.” How to explain what he’d done? Better not. “Needed to...ah.” 

No delicate way of putting it. “Uhm. Give you focus.” He winced. That sounded 

bad. 

“Focus.” Dan cleared his throat, parched. Dreaded to move his head, 

pounding away with a jackhammer inside. “Don’t understand.” Thoughts already 

flittering forward. Couldn’t quite hold onto anything. Too much effort. 

Opening his eyes, he looked at Vadim. It took him a moment to cut through 

the blurry picture, before he made out pale eyes, sharp-featured face, shaved blond 

hair. Dan smiled. Childlike. For just this moment. “What happened?” Murmured. 

Why are you here, why do I hurt, how did I survive, and what are those hours that I 

have lost. 

“You were under the boot of the Soviet Army when it came down,” said 

Vadim. Easier to speak Russian now. “It nearly crushed you. I was tasked to find a 

rebel leader, and found you amidst...the ruins.” Vadim reached to the side and 

offered the canteen again. “You were in shock. I waited for you to return. I think it 

was shock, you were far gone.” Vadim’s jaw muscles tightened. “Something hit 

you in the head, another shot in the leg. Dehydrated, but nothing serious.” 

“I remember death.” Dan shuddered, reached for the refilled canteen, drank 

in deep gulps. Finished and wiped his lips on the other’s uniform. Every movement 

hurt his head. “Remember stench. Couldn’t move.” Handing the canteen back, Dan 

suddenly tensed. “I was buried alive.” Shook his head, fuck the pain that caused. 

“No, don’t want to remember.” Closed his eyes instead. 

Vadim ran his fingers down Dan’s face, careful to not touch the wound. 

“Rest. Just the usual stuff. Just war, Dan.” Maybe I’ll tell you one day, but not now. 

It made me fucking throw up, and you were in there, what? A day? Two? Fucked 

up? “You are safe, for the moment. I need to leave in maybe two days, three when 

 397 

I’m stretching it.” And I will, of course. Stretch my luck again, just to make sure 

you’re alright. Worse than friendship could hurt.  

Dan kept his eyes closed, smiled again. Was much easier to simply listen to 

the voice, feel the touch, and refuse to remember. Could feel the lead descending 

onto his limbs, taking his mind back down into sleep. “Got food?” Too tired to eat, 

yet his body was hungry. Didn’t wait for an answer, already dropping off within 

moments. 

“Plenty,” murmured Vadim and felt the insane impulse to make Dan eat 

Russian food, as if he could just invite him after a cold winter day into the 

apartment and feed him with a stew that had been boiling away for hours and hours, 

and keep pouring him tea, and show him food that he probably didn’t know. 

Nothing like the rations that he did have and despised, or the nuts and dried fruits 

that he kept because they kept him going in the mountains, far better than the 

rations managed. No, a long, relaxed dinner with friends, with vodka, and courses 

upon courses, saved for for weeks, if not months, only to have one feast. 

“I’m delusional,” he muttered. “What’s going on in your stupid head, 

Vadim,” he cursed softly. It was wrong, wanting that, wrong trying to share these 

things, or even feeling the impulse to. Not in the middle of a war. 

But Dan was asleep already, his face smoothing and his breath evening out. 

Just a man, not an enemy. Wounded, tired and hurting. Sheltered by another. 

Vadim only left his side to piss, or prepare tea, or check the surroundings 

for any sign of Mujahideen activity, but nothing he could spot, and he didn’t 

venture far from the cave. At the moment, they were both living off his rations – 

and the food in Dan’s bergan, and all Vadim did was make sure Dan had all the 

rest he needed. Taking a strange pleasure from Dan lying close and needing his 

help, his care, and even his protection. It was like repaying him, and it was also 

like owning him on some level. Which was probably not the nicest thought, but it 

was this sense of belonging that Vadim cherished.  

Dan had no idea what time of day or night it was, nor how long he had slept, 

when he woke once more. Had neither a clue where he was, what had happened, 

and why the fuck he was hurting. For a moment, while waking, he couldn’t even 

fathom out why he was warm on one side, and why there was something heavy 

across his body. Moving, sluggishly, until his leg protested and he hissed. 

 398 

Vadim opened his eyes when something pulled the blanket off his shoulder, 

and it registered with him. He looked at Dan in the near-darkness. “You alright?” 

“Hungry.” That was easy. Identifying the major feeling in his body. 

“Thirsty?” Number two was getting a bit more complicated, and he was having a 

hard time trying to figure out the rest. “Head hurts.” Like a motherfucker, but at 

least less than before. “Leg...” remembered that one, made sense, and he shifted 

again, stilled, moved his head, ever so slowly. Looked up, trying to make out the 

shape close to him. “Arse?” Had already forgotten he’d asked before. 

Vadim gave a low chuckle and reached for the canteen, opened it and held 

it to Dan’s lips, digging for dried fruit when Dan had taken a few mouthfuls of 

water. Slipped small pieces between Dan’s lips, allowing him plenty of time to 

chew and swallow, and offered water afterwards. “The leg looks alright. You’ll 

enjoy that for a while longer.” 

Taking his time to swallow and chew, then drink some water, Dan was 

starting to feel more human, yet didn’t realise that being hand-fed wasn’t quite 

what special forces guys did. The liquid and fruit sugar seemed to help with his 

head. He groaned as he tried to stretch, very carefully, at least he had his limbs 

under control. Some sort of progress. 

“Aching.” Dan tried to prop himself up on his elbow. Feeling every bone in