I didn’t question why. Mike started all this likely before any of us were born - and most of us here owed him our lives, if we kept track of such things. When Mike says that he wants the bar for a night, he gets the bar for the night. All he said was that the gang needed to do some healing tonight - and that, for one time, I couldn’t do it.
I, of course, didn’t mind. It felt like a good night to limber the fingers and do some work with Zoey, Fast Eddie, and Lady Macbeth. Maybe it was something in the air, maybe it was the sad gaze that came from Mike’s face as he worked his magic behind the bar, but the blues just came. Fast Eddie was magic, Zoey’s bass and vocals were in rare form, and Lady Macbeth felt like an extension of myself as we jammed. In the Conch Republic, blues were hard to find, and it felt strangely invigorating to feel it come again - and it all came from one set of eyes. Whatever had Mike concerned had him really troubled.
Then they walked in - and I understood exactly why I couldn’t be the one healing tonight. It had been a very long time since I’d seen eyes like that.
When you associate yourself with Sally’s Place, you tend to forget what the other side of prostitution is like - and, since marrying Zoey, I’ve never really needed to go to one. People had enjoyable sex at Sally’s Place; whatever happened had no such motivations as money or fear. Just as Mike offered spiritual healing in a barroom, Sally offered spiritual healing in a brothel. Both were pretty contradictory, once you thought about it... which made them both pretty successful.
But these girls... they’d been on the other side. The hollow, haunted, scared gaze, the way they tended to shrink from the men... they had the dead look of hookers there too long. This hadn’t been about shared joy or pain - too many men (and quite possibly women) had simply dumped their pain onto these unwilling souls. And... for whatever reason... they had no choice but to take it. They’d had to absorb a world of hurt, so much so that they didn’t know how to release it anymore.
The reason why I couldn’t handle this one was clear and simple: I was the father of a fourteen-year-old girl. Sure, a fourteen-year-old girl who could put most university faculty to shame by herself... but still a fourteen-year-old girl. And the four with the look (correction, three; the girl with the wings had a slightly less intense gaze) weren’t that much older than Erin.
My first instinct was to put down Lady Macbeth and find her; not surprisingly, Zoey beat me to the punch, finding her in a discreet corner of The Place. Still, I found my place around the two, holding them both close. Erin was slightly embarassed at our reaction, but she understood that sometimes parents need their children for support.
Heaven knew I needed her for mine.
“Dad... this may be more serious than you think.”
I blinked at her words. “What do you mean, honey?”
Erin’s face, I saw, was cast in stone. She never really got angry, but this was the closest she got. “Those girls... their tattoos are more than decoration. They’re slaves, Daddy... they’re slaves.”
“Submit!” Harry crowed, and the girls flinched. Of all the times for the bird to speak... and of all the things that bird to say, that had to be the worst. I swallowed hard; I felt Zoey’s arms tighten around her. “You mean... their masters marked their territory?”
“It’s more than that, Dad,” Erin whispered. “Though I think you should let Uncle Mike do his work, first.” I looked around. A few others had recognized what was going on, and kept their silence; most, however, had no clue.
That is, until Mike started feeding the drinks. Most of us, if need be, could drink anyone else under a table. These girls, however, were drinking the stuff like water. Well, most of them, anyway. The one with the wings, the one ‘different’ from the others, wasn’t. In fact, she stared at it as though it were some snake ready to bite. But the others... they were drinking one after another, and showing no effects - none at all.
Oh, this was going to be interesting. I couldn’t help but laugh as she tried her first taste of God’s Blessing, and didn’t find it to her liking, the other girls laughed as well.
The laughs died too quickly, though. Definitely some major problems - likely exactly what Erin had said. A moment of silence hung over the place, and I held my breath. Everyone knew what was coming next.
I saw one of the girls - the oldest, with a severe shoulder-length haircut, dark eyes, and clothes that were no less attractive for being conservative - asked for a Long Island Iced Tea. Callahan nodded and offered it to her; she took it, stepped out into the open, and raised her glass.
“To family.”
My heart stopped. I remembered giving my own version of that toast - just before breaking down in tears. See, a long time ago, I had a wife named Barbara; beautiful daughter, too. Then, one day, the brakes failed, and I didn’t have them anymore. For some reason, I had a feeling that this girl’s story was going to make mine look like a fairy tale.
She drained her glass in a heartbeat, then reared her arm back like a baseball pitcher. The hearth was parabolic; it should handle any throw she’d make, no problem.
I never expected a glass to actually knock a brick loose. She threw with such force that the brick shattered with the throw. I swallowed; Mickey Finn going all out could probably do that, but anyone else...
What had happened to this girl?
“Damn, that felt good,” she snarled, then visibly sagged. “I... My name is Nabiki. Nabiki Saotome now; my old name, before all this happened was... aw, who cares. I don’t want to give my old family name; I’m not exactly proud of them.”
“What were they, mass murderers?” Tommy Jannsen piped up; Fast Eddie put a hand on his shoulder, a gentle way of shutting him up. Fast Eddie... yeah, he probably had those eyes once, too, considering what he’d lived through. He probably knew exactly what this girl was about to say.
“Yes - and worse,” she replied icily; Tommy gulped. “I never knew my father; he was probably one of the johns that came by Mother’s whorehouse. My mother... was a Madam; she ran a whorehouse in the Nerima district of Tokyo.” She shook her head. “And she was... she was a monster.”
She took a deep breath. “Mother... got her kicks out of controlling people. The only people she gave a damn about in her life were the customers... and us kids. We were her flesh and blood, her babies, and she would destroy anyone who threatened her family or her operation. I grew up with the idea that enslaving others was normal, that it was all right that we do it to others. Mother taught us the basics of her trade as we grew up, how to mix ‘power drinks’ that would leave a person’s mind pliable, the basics of tantric and tattoo magic... we were being bred to be slavers just like Mom. I didn’t see the eyes of those Mom enslaved, didn’t see the bodies of those she killed, and didn’t care; they were enslaved, and I wasn’t.”
She took a deep breath. “My older sister, Kasumi... she didn’t care, either - about anyone else. One night, when I was thirteen years old, Mother saw us to bed, tucked us in; I heard Kasumi sneak out, but paid it no mind. She was two years older than me; I figured she’d be going out with friends or a boyfriend or something else.”
She rubbed her forehead carefully. From what I could see, it looked like a tattoo design was missing from there. “The next morning... everything had changed. Mother was dead; it was determined to be a heart attack, but I suspect it may have been poison. Not that I could tell the police that, though... not that I could tell anyone that. She had painted an obedience geas symbol at the center of my forehead - the first of many tattoos twisting me into a whore - and a murderer.”
She unbuttoned the cuffs on her blouse, and pulled them back to her shoulders; more tattoos make themselves apparent. “Tattoo magic is a tricky thing... but, if done properly, is almost impossible to break. Kasumi had planned this; she’d taken Mother’s business, and made slaves of Akane and me overnight. She... She forced me to sit still as she tattood me. With the patterns she weaved over my body, she made me stronger, faster, immune to disease... but also, incredibly sensitive and bound to her will. Perhaps even worse, she carved another symbol into our abdomens that curses us all to have only girls. You can guess what she’d do with any children.” She gestured to her wrists. “These... made sure we’d have to do it, even if we weren’t around; within about six hours, I’m going to want it so bad it’s ridiculous. But... that’s what she wanted.”
“Oh, I’m soooo horny...” Harry crowed, and I swallowed. I really didn’t want Harry messing with this. Him saying lewd comments while we’re playing blues is one thing, him saying lewd comments while a young woman was trying to sort out the peices of her life was another. My eyes caught the eyes of several others; they weren’t hearing Harry; hopefully, neither was she. She had everyone’s attention. I looked over at Fast Eddie; he was shaking like a leaf.
Nabiki cast a death glare at the parrot, then continued. “She broke us the first day.” Upon a glance from Akane, she coughed. “Actually, let me correct that. She broke me on the first day. She forced me to perform for her... to pleasure her in every way possible, and enjoy it.” She looked down, with that long, uncomfortable face that suggested she was about to lose her lunch. “After that... she ordered me to break Akane in. I’m sorry, Akane... I’m so sorry...”
“It’s okay, Nabiki...” another girl replied. “It wasn’t your fault.”
Nabiki nodded. “It was never our fault... but it was our bodies, wasn’t it? Every day... every day, we’d be offered for our services. Sometimes men, sometimes women, sometimes entire groups of people. I’m immune to disease, so I could do it with anyone without a problem - and, as such, I had no excuse for taking it easy. We were useful toys for her - and we did our jobs well.”
She walked toward the bar, and gripped the ‘bar’ part of the bar firmly; everyone gulped as she left an impression in the metal. “I... I couldn’t do anything directly; I couldn’t think of any way to get out of the situation. That was before I met Kinnosuke... and found out just how evil my sister had become.”
She sighed for a moment; dreamy eyes spoke of a young love. By comparison, two of the other girls at the bar winced. “Kinnosuke was handsome, he was young, he was rich... his father paid for his first night at the house, and he developed a liking for me. He was the only one outside of the girls who ever showed any concern for me. After a few months of time together... I decided to make my move. I had to; Kodachi had already joined by this time, and I found myself as the unofficial leader of the enslaved, so... so I felt I had to find a way out for us.”
She took a deep, ragged breath. “I... I pleaded with him to stop my sister. I didn’t care; murder, police... anything... just to get out of this hell.” She covered her face in her hands. “He agreed, and contacted the police.”
Nabiki paced back and forth along the bar; for the most part, nobody was interrupting her. “Kasumi already had the police in her pocket, of course, and found out what had happened. So... the next time he came by, Kasumi knocked him out - and painted a geas diamond on his forehead.”
She licked her lips; her hands shook with terror. I wasn’t sure if that was a good sign or a bad one; the dead eyes I’d seen at first were one thing, but this...
“She changed him into a woman, then filmed you humiliating her utterly before you murdered her.”
My eyes turned toward my daughter; all others did the same. Nabiki looked completely horrified. “How did you...”
“If it’s on the Internet, I know about it,” Erin said matter-of-factly. “My mentor was the embodiment of the Internet; because of her and the circumstances of my birth, I know everything that can be found there.” Her mouth turned downward into a sad droop. “Including the pay-per-view porn sites. It’s not pleasant to know humanity at its worst.” She raised an eyebrow. “Though I am confused as to how she managed the sex change...”
“That’s Jusenkyo,” Ranma interjected. “I used to be a guy, before... and Kasumi could change into a guy, if she wanted.”
“Ah, I see. So that is real,” she replied. “How... odd.”
Nabiki snarled. “That was our life. That was MY LIFE, dammit; she twisted it into... into...” She felt the tears coming down; she wiped them away, and stared at the moisture in her fingertips. “My God, I’m crying... I haven’t cried in so long...”
Mike placed another drink on the counter. “You’d be surprised the good a few tears can do.”
“I ran out of tears a long time ago,” Nabiki replied, the mask over her face once more. “Once she saw that she could make me do anything, she started taking more hit jobs. We were the perfect killers - efficient, stealthy, and bulletproof. Not that we didn’t continue with our prostitution - no, that was an everyday occurrence, and we were the best at it. For four years, we did that, for every day; sex, sex, murder, more sex... about the only truly pleasant moments were the ones I shared with my sisters.” She took a deep breath. “We didn’t have anybody - except each other.”
After a long pause, she stood up straight, her eyes relaxed. The pain had receded a bit from her eyes; the tears had done her some good. “Then we heard that another girl was going to be joining the group. We met her, feared what was going to happen to her, and really didn’t want to get involved with breaking her. No... Kasumi wanted that pleasure all for herself.”
The smile that Nabiki came up with was probably the most malicious I’d ever seen. It was that of a lion gloating over a wounded gazelle. “Kasumi miscalculated. Ranma was already affected by other techniques, ones which made her inappropriate for the tattoo controls that Kasumi had put on her. Ranma has this problem where she acts like a cat under certain conditions; instead of being controlled by the geas, the cat in her ripped Kasumi apart.” She rubbed her arms together; no doubt, even here, the Keys had become horribly cold. “My sister was dead... and I was ecstatic over it. My own sister... and I was rejoicing that she was gone.”
“Your sister was gone a long time ago,” Mike interjected. “She died the night your mother died. After that, it was just a monster in your sister’s body.” He sighed. “Nobody makes slaves out of family - not while keeping the right to call them family.”
“You don’t think I don’t know that?” Nabiki snarled. “Kasumi’s dead, and I danced on her entrails. Unfortunately, I can’t get away from what she did to me!”
“How so?” I asked, before realizing, then mentally kicked myself.
Her cold gaze turned to me; she ripped off her blouse, exposing herself to the group. The tattoos were far more obvious now that her blouse was off; several still glowed with power. “These, dammit! I... I can’t escape from this... and nobody can remove these...” Her knees buckled, and she collapsed in front of me, tears her only comfort.
“Let me be the judge of that, Ms. Saotome.”
Forty pairs of eyes turned to the entrance, and I couldn’t help but smile. If anyone could fix a cursed prostitute, Sally could. I smiled at the pair behind her; she, Mary and Mickey were welcome anytime. They were the equivalent of the cavalry... and sorely needed now.
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(Posted Sat, 04 Jan 2003 07:54)
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