Bulgaria

Now Angela was sipping her second iced coffee in the snack bar, along with the others, except Professor Lundquist, who had to leave for an appointment. They were waiting for Kai-Kai to come out of the men’s room, and Mr. and Mrs. Penka to come out of the women’s room. Mr. Penka being in the women’s room was not a big deal. Hardly anybody would be using these bathrooms today, and anyway Mr. Penka could hardly be blamed for helping his wife recover.

“That was the strangest impreg I’ve ever seen,” Phil said finally.

“I was wondering if any of them were like that,” Mrs. Viedert said.

“Never,” Angela said. Then, “It’s good they both came, and at the same time, but I don’t think it was pleasurable.”

“Yes,” Phil said. “They were both forced into orgasm.”

Duvon had been even more affected than the others, and sounded not like himself. “So? The important thing is that they’re not hurt.”

“I don’t like the idea of forced orgasms,” Phil said.

“It’s not like they were tied to some kind of f**king machine. They forced themselves. Look, this is not sex. This is medicine. This is making a vaccine to save lives.”

Angela didn’t like it put so bluntly, but . . . “Yeah . . . I guess you’re right.”

Kai-Kai emerged from the men’s room, face and hands and genitals washed, trying to look cheerful but clearly tired. He stood in front of the others, hands at his sides, as if reporting for duty. His flaccid penis was a little reddish on the last two inches. “Hi folks.”

After an awkward silence Duvon said, “You must be exhausted. Why don’t you sit down.”

“I —I don’t think I can.”

“Sorry, Kai-Kai, your butt must hurt,” Angela said.

“I think I’m o.k.”

“Do you mind if I look?”

A stranger to bodily shame, the always-naked boy pulled up a chair, turned around, hitched up a leg, and spread his butt cheeks for their inspection. It was as casual as if he were showing them a scratch on his finger. The three inseminated women looked at each other in surprise.

Angela, no stranger to inspecting the Sire, leaned forward. “Could you spread a little more? . . . I see you’re still a bit opened up. . .” She looked closely at the boy’s slightly opened sphincter, at this anus which was on full public view at all times, much photographed, even much drawn by art majors whom Kai-Kai didn’t mind spreading his butt cheeks for while he chatted with his friends on the quad, this anus which was pried open every week at those inspections . . . hundreds of people had peered inside it and now with reflected sunlight off the floor Angela could see the dull red walls of the boy’s interior . . . this anus which distended around dildos during the later stages of the Lab drainings, swallowed various ingenious sex toys at those draining parties . . . and during all those many experiences the boy’s delicate rear tissues had never been injured . . . until now!

Or maybe not. Angela was as relieved as everyone else when she said, “It looks a little red, but that’s it.” As Kai-Kai released his hands and turned around he said, “I thought so.” He massaged his butt. He looked at the chair and said, “Maybe I can sit, uh, side-saddle.”

The women’s room door opened and out came Mr. and Mrs. Penka. Her eyes were a little red but thankfully she seemed to have recovered. Her dress had been carefully rearranged, though it was unavoidably sweaty.

Mrs. Penka’s first move was to go over to Kai-Kai and hug him. “Thank you Sire, for your sperm.” This was a frequent and well-rehearsed line from women whose English was poor. It was always sincere. “Yes, thank you,” Mr. Penka added.

Before leaving they wanted Kai-Kai to pose for one more picture. Mrs. Penka took off her spangled apron. “It’s called a prestilka,” Mr. Penka said. “It has the colors of my country’s flag. We’d like you to wear it for the photograph.”

This caused an awkward moment. Angela and Phil and Duvon looked at Kai-Kai.

“I’m —not allowed to wear anything,” the boy said.

Phil said, “C’mon, the extra tenth of a degree of heat might kill maybe two or three sperm out of the 12 kazillion or so you have in those huge balls of yours . . . And besides, with you covered up down there, the photo can be on the front page of Dnevnik!”

“That too!” Mr. Penka said in his old gregarious voice, which got a big laugh.

What are rules for anyway? the Sire seemed to say, with a shrug of his bare shoulders. And so the impreg ended happily, with Angela going behind to tie the string above the Sire’s butt, and the Sire standing between the smiling Bulgarian couple, proud to wear the woman’s prestilka, which for him was a great deal of clothing. Duvon took the photo with Mr. Penka’s iPhone. The prestilka, not designed to cover a male endowment, let alone an extremely large one, protruded well in front of the boy like a horizontal tent. When the Penkas submitted the photo to Dnevnik, the Governmental Affairs Committee pointed out to the editors that cropping it would have made the boy look like he was naked, which would have offended official sensibilities. So the full photo with the protruding prestilka, the Bulgarian colors hoisted on the hidden flagpole, made the front page, above the fold no less.