Axe. Hatchets. They can only be talking about Axyl!
The anger came boiling up out of the depths of her soul, and when one of the men stepped close to begin cutting her loose from the fusion cycle, he took a step back as he looked into her eyes.
“Boys! I think we’ll need a few more guys to get this bitch tied in the pen.”
By the time they had her off the bike, they realized they should have wired all of her limbs together. Porter had Ghost Wind’s arm twisted up between her shoulder blades, thinking there was nothing she could do when she simply counter-spun away from him, stealing the leverage that he thought he had. The spinning crescent kick to his face took him off his feet and he landed hard.
Another biker tried to punch her, and she dropped under the punch and hit him six times in the ribs with punches so fast they sounded like machine gun fire. As he started to crumple, she snapped a hard kick into his groin. Grogan, came in and took a hard round kick to his face, but being too much of a cave man to realize he was being hurt, managed to hit her hard on the jaw. She went down, stunned.
By the time they chained her to the wall in the slave pen, she had been stripped down to her breechcloth and bandeau, and she had taken a few more punches and kicks. Her captors however were worse for wear and most either limped or were pinching bloody noses, and at least one would probably not be sexually interfering with anyone for a good long time.
As the old jail block door slammed shut, and Ghost Wind’s eyes adjusted to the gloom she realized she was far from alone. The smell of fear and unwashed bodies wafted over her, and she saw, chained in various places along the wall, other women. They were stripped down to undergarments in most cases, though a few were nude. All looked at her, the newcomer with a mixture of wariness and pity. And hopelessness.
She looked at her wrists, which had been tied together with old baling wire and then wired to a chain in the wall. The wire, while leaving her a little room for circulation was far too tight to wiggle out of, but she thought she might be able
to work the wire link to the chain back and forth enough to get it to snap.
A voice softly drifted over to her, “So if you get loose, what then?”
She looked up and saw one of the women, Latina by the look of her watching intently.
“Better to have my hands loose from the wall than be double bound when an opportunity arises,” Ghost Wind replied.
“Yeah. Good luck with that.” The woman looked away.
****
“They got her!” Axyl said, walking into the room energetically. “I can’t believe it. They fucking got her.”
Darwin Shell, once again looking over the street to the river, smiled. He turned toward his beaming lieutenant. “Fortune favors the fortunate in this case, Axyl. She evidently wasn’t paying attention and stepped right out in front of Porter and his boys as they were going up to get ready at New Hope. Under the circumstances, I could easily forgive them for postponing that to bring our savage little canary here to sing for me.”
Axyl’s face darkened. “I’m telling you, boss, when you get the location for Eli and his hidden little village, kill her quick. For my sake, for your sake, for everyone’s sake, blow her away all business-like, ‘cause she is trouble slash death in a curvy package.”
“Really, Axyl. Man-up. She’s just a woman. She may bare her teeth and kick of few of our more stupid employees in the crotch, but she’s not some primal force as you seem to fear.” Shell sighed. “She’s just a tool at the moment, one that will give us the means to find the biggest thorn in our side, AKA Eli. We have her, and if she doesn’t want some extreme unpleasantness laid upon her, she will do what I tell her.”
“Yeah?” the Axe Man replied, stung by the accusation against his masculinity. “Let’s see how you feel when she gets loose and runs a sharp knife across your throat late some night.”
“Yes, yes, I’m sure. Now how has our deployment to New Hope gone?”
“We’re trickling our guys into the area, so as to not get ‘em suspicious with a lot of activity. By tomorrow evening, we’ll have all our soldiers and the C4 in place.”
“I love it when a plan comes together.”
****
“Too bad we don’t get to have the bitch first!”
Four men came into the cell, growling at the other women, telling them to shut up, then concentrated on Ghost Wind. They came with a strange device she had never seen before and there was no preamble, one of them simply put the device to her shoulder and thumbed a button on the thing.
“GAHHHH!!!”
Ghost Wind thought for a moment that she’d been hit by a lightning bolt, then she stopped thinking other than wanting the pain to stop. When the device was pulled back, she shuddered and trembled so badly that she couldn’t control her limbs and a part of her was immensely glad she had used the provided bucket next to her before the men had come. Soiling herself in front of these vermin would have been a terrible humiliation.
They didn’t even bother to unwire her wrists, instead simply cutting her bonds with a pair of wire cutters, then re-tying them with what looked like mountain climbing rope from the Beforetime.
“Suck it up, Buttercup,” the one called Porter said as they yanked her to her feet. She saw her own heavy homemade blade stuffed into the front of his belt, but she couldn’t make her arms work to try for it.
“She ain’t such a pistol now, is she?” It was the terrible smelling one hanging on to her arm on the other side. He slapped her hard and she saw stars. “Little payback for that kick to my face earlier, bitch!”
“Time to go see the boss man, girly-girl. And I sincerely hope you try that hard-ass attitude with him. The results will be funnier than hell!” Porter said, “Mr. Shell don’t take no shit off no one.”
Ghost Wind was not a small woman, but the men simply lifted her so her feet only touched the ground every few steps. They fast-marched her up a flight of stairs to the third floor to a spotless carpeted hallway. Coming to a heavy wooden door, they knocked tentatively, and Porter stuck his head in.
“Uh, hey, boss,” he said uncertainly, “we brung the chica, like ya asked.”
A rich voice, almost theatrical in its tone, called out, “By all means Porter, bring our guest in! We’ve all been dying of anticipation to meet her.”
They half-dragged her into a luxurious office, with several men standing against the various walls, watching her. She was taken to the center of the room, to a chain with a tow-hook on the end that hung down where once a fancy lighting fixture had been. Her tied hands were looped over the hook. The balls of her feet barely touched the floor, and Porter looked at the set-up disapprovingly.
“She’s just a tad too tall, boss. Her tip-toes is touchin’ the floor.”
“We’ll just have to make do, Porter. I’d like to get this show on the road. You and Grogan just stick close to her, and discourage any acrobatics she might want to try out.”
Ghost Wind had recovered enough to look around the very cold room, but it was all she could do to remain calm. Anything,
anything
could happen to her here, and no one would intervene, no one would help her. She was entirely on her own in a room full of the worst sort of men.
Calm your mind warrior.
Jannelle’s voice again sounded in her head.
The calm mind prevails. Gather the information you need to escape.
She didn’t know if her teacher’s voice was from the spirit world or from her own psyche desperately trying to hold it together, but Ghost Wind began to observe her surroundings in depth. They had let the fire go out in the makeshift wood stove and the room was very cold on her exposed skin. It was obviously to put her even farther out of her comfort zone, if such a thing were possible.
“Now, Miss Ghost Wind… what a wonderful nom de guerre, so… romantic.” An older man dressed in a heavy gray wool military trench coat, smiled at her benignly. “I’m Darwin Shell, perhaps you’ve heard of me? I know you’ve heard of my associate, Axyl, the ‘Axe Man.’ In fact, I believe you have a history?”
“Axyyyyll.” The growl came from her throat, as her eyes finally came to rest on the man who had killed her beloved teacher. The sound caused some of the men in the room to look nervously at her, but Axyl literally took a step back, bumping into the wall. He saw a hate in her eyes that warned of painful death if she were ever to get him alone.
“Ah! I see my lieutenant’s description of your affection for him was not exaggerated!” Shell grinned. “I guess we’ll have to take this slowly, so I can get past the deep feelings you have for him. You may be wondering why you’re still alive, when Axyl has been advocating a ‘shoot on sight’ policy where you are concerned. It’s really quite simple, I need information.”
To her horror, Ghost Wind felt a scaly hand starting to reach up under her top, to cup her left breast. She turned her head and saw the smelly one, Grogan staring at her chest, his face blank and a thin trickle of drool coming from his mouth as he worked his way towards her nipple. She tried to jerk away.
“Oh for fuck’s sake!” Shell yelled, “Grogan! Stop! How can she concentrate when…”
Grogan wasn’t hearing his employer’s irritation, his eyes looking glazed and hypnotized.
“Axyl, discipline that dog.” Shell’s pique grew even more when he realized his second-in-command had no intention of going near the woman. “Someone?”
Cord stepped from a shadowy spot by the wall and with some malice hit Grogan in the back of the head. “Your boss is trying to talk, ass-wipe. Quit molesting her so she can fucking concentrate on what he’s fucking saying!”
Grogan, raised both arms to protect his head, giving Cord a look of pure hate, which Cord returned. For a second, the dark-haired man’s eyes met Ghost Wind’s, and his look was one of deep shame. He looked away quickly, and returned to his spot by the wall.
“Thank you, Cord. Grogan, don’t interrupt me again,” Shell said. “As I was saying, miss, we can work things out amicably here. I need something from you, and you very seriously need my good will at this point.”
The assault on her person should have left her frazzled, but instead, it focused her warrior self. As she listened to Shell, it crystalized in her that her main intent needed to be escape from this situation, not defiance or revenge on Axyl. With that, as she listened, she watched the room, looking for options.
“What do you need from me, other than the usual things men like you want from a woman?”
“Ah. No pleading, no crying. How refreshing!” Shell said amicably, “What I want from you is very simple, young lady. I want Eli. I want his little hidden town amongst the pines. I know you know them both, so let’s make this easy on everybody, especially you, and just give me what I need.”
For just a second, she was tempted. She still remembered Kita’s nasty reaction to her truthful words and the humiliation of walking out of the village, knowing she wasn’t wanted there. But then she remembered Eli, his kindness and Kenji and all the other innocents of Yama No Matsu. But even more than that, she remembered that this was the man who had sent Axyl to murder her teacher and ruin her life.
If she died killing him, she could live with that.
No. You must escape. See the way out before you. Remember the wrist dislocation techniques you were taught.
Jannelle’s voice sounded so close she looked to the side, expecting her teacher to be standing there.
The path to freedom is right in front of you.
“I barely know Eli, I only met him two days ago,” she said. “He mentioned something about a village, but I thought that was the farm village.” She noted that the leader, Shell had her engraved pistol stuck in his belt, barely visible under the heavy military wool coat he wore.
“Oh, I am afraid that is not the answer I want to hear. Let me be honest with you, telling me the truth I want to hear is what is going to keep this from being a very long, painful and humiliating night for you. These randy young bucks are more than happy, in fact eager to come at you one, or maybe two at a time while you hang there helpless. After each one has enjoyed himself, I will ask you my questions again. I would guess after a short time, your attitude will be much more… pliable.”
She noted the desk Shell stood behind, right in front of a floor to ceiling plate glass window.
“I’ll tell you everything I know! Please, just give me a moment to think of everything he said!”
“Why, of course, my dear, I in no way wish to rush…”
Ghost Wind felt the hoary hand on her bare ribs, moving up towards her top and looked to her left. Once again, the idiot Grogan, face blank and drooling was starting to grope her.
Perfect.
“Why, of course, my dear, I in no way wish to rush…”
Shell stopped his urbane and gentlemanly reply to his captive when he realized that he, once again, had lost her attention to Grogan’s Neanderthal pawing. Fury boiled up as he realized the idiot was directly disobeying his orders yet again. Perhaps some soldiers were simply too stupid to be worth keeping around and feeding.
Shell gestured at the cretin. “Cord, if you please, would you mind kicking the living shit out of this imbecile, please?”
As the dark haired man stepped from the wall again, things went strange.
He saw her flex her feet for a moment then Shell heard a popping sound, like one might hear when ligaments were over-stretched, come from her hands. Immediately afterward, the woman fell to the floor. She landed on all fours, her head lower than her butt, which was aimed towards Grogan. The man’s face changed from a blank hypnotized stare to the look of a man who had died and gone to heaven.
Heaven however, was not what he received, quite the opposite.
Looking over her left shoulder, the black haired woman’s foot lashed up and straight out into some kind of karate mule kick and her heel impacted Grogan’s crotch so hard that Shell was sure he heard the man’s testicles squish from ten feet away. The imbecile went up and over backwards, making the sound a pig makes when it knows it’s about to have its throat cut and he landed hard. Grogan went into the fetal position instantly, rocking and screaming.