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The Price of a Life

MoldaviteGreen

The world’s upside down here…
Joined
Dec 7, 2018
A droplet of scorching hot water fell over blushed cheek, steaming serenity broken by a shrill cry. Not a move was made to slip from the frosted glass cage, slick with dew drops and filled with steam as near-boiling water swirled about angry-red feet. A pair of warm beige hands, tanned from bathing beneath a summer sun, smoothed across wet skin, drawing droplets away from closed eyes. Dark lashes caught a droplet that clung there before falling over the sharp sweep of angled cheekbone and plunged from jawline.

Only a terrified scream, the clammering of steel and a gunshot was enough to draw those hands in momentary pause at narrow shoulders. Even then they did not still for long, sweeping the gentle lather of soapy foam across the rounded slopes of heavy breasts. Any usual woman wouldn’t have done as they’d instructed. Any usual woman would have been on her knees, trembling in fear as she begged for her life. Any usual woman would not have been the image of peace and calm as she stood beneath the waterfall of scorching water, as if she had all the time in the world.

But she was no usual woman.

~​

“Affedersiniz efendim?” A map was held between small hands, only the forefinger’s nail painted a deep shade of ocean blue as it pointed to a star indicating a tourist destination. It tapped only once, guiding the older man’s attention downwards as he came to a pause amidst the bustling alleyway, approached by a woman several decades his junior. “İngilizce biliyor musunuz?” Do you speak English? While her words were near textbook perfect, an unusual accent lingered like a sweet aftertaste. She’d dreamt of visiting Turkey for many years, had studied the country while she imagined all of the places she wanted to go, and she was almost fluent.

The older man, his beard only just beginning to grey, nodded his head. “I speak English.” Dark eyes held her gaze, before dropping once more to the map she held between them. “You wish to visit here?” Calloused finger tapped the star. “I could think of many other places a young woman such as yourself should be, rather than a dusty tomb.” Dark brows knitted together, the man looking up to glance over her shoulder. “You travel alone?”

The map was pulled away, roughly folded back up and held against chest as arms were crossed beneath heavy bust. This conversation was going dangerous places, and she needed to vacate. “Thank you for your time. Görüşürüz.” She gave a polite nod, spied a broad-shouldered middle aged man beginning to cut through the crowd toward them and began to make off in the opposite direction.

That was until her elbow was caught by calloused fingers in a rough, possessive grip. “It is dangerous to be travelling alone and even more dangerous to be ignoring my questions.” Dark eyes bored into her, scanning youthful features in assessment. “Until we meet again.” Rough hand released elbow only to be held up in motion, the middle age man coming to an immediate halt a little ways off in the crowd before melting back into the shadows from which he’d come. The corner of mouth twitched, the older man grinning something wicked. “Görüşürüz.”


~​

His had been the face that she had woken to, as the drug-induced fog still clung to the edges of sleepy mind as she’d clawed her way into consciousness only half an hour ago. His had been the face that had been leaning over her, leering as he taunted her in Turkish before she’d been yanked from the dusty hardwood floor by a limp arm and shoved down a flight of stairs, finding herself in a showering block amongst cowering, naked women. His had also been the face she’d spat in, earning her a backhand across her right cheek, warm skin split and bleeding from the ring on his hand.

Face tilted backwards, the water streaming over angelic features now, hands scrubbing at her cheeks for a split second longer. They wanted them clean. They wanted them to smell fresh. But the ironic thing was that they wouldn’t want her when they realised just how imperfect their merchandise was.

Dark hair, a shade barely lighter than black, was swept away from gentle features and against skull, slick and heavy with water. Eyes fluttered open, the bright colour of the Mediterranean Sea with flecks of gold and green, looking at nothing as they fixed on a falling droplet that glided across the frosted surface of the glass in slow motion. The sting at her cheek barely registered, the throb at her ear where a red plastic tag had been punctured into the cartilage shell nagged her far worse. Truth be told, she savoured that pain, even now as she pressed the flat of her palms against the metal frame of the glass panes and leant forward. It served as a reminder that she was alive, even if for but a little while.

A dark, hulking figure appeared on the other side of the glass and the door was soon torn wide open, sending a gush of steam into the large, mostly concrete, room. A rough hand caught her by upper arm, dragging her from inside to toss her towards the opposite wall. Girls were being plucked one by one from their showers, tossed without care of whether they fell to their knees, staggered and struck the wall or simply slumped in near unconsciousness. There was a meaty slap of a naked body striking concrete that echoed about the room, men dressed in black denim and leather ushering the girls to their feet or dragging them by hair or arm or ankle across the floor.

A sharp jab at her back prompted her forward.

~​

“Are you sure that this is the place you’d like to go to?” The gentle lilt of her mother’s voice was roughened only by early morning and rich coffee. “I’m sure it is a beautiful country, but some places are best not to travel when travelling alone.”

“Mama,” she laughed lightly, setting down the porcelain cup atop saucer. “I have booked flights and hotels already. I’m absolutely sure that this is where I want to go. I’ve wanted to visit Turkey all of my life.” The handle was released, small hand reaching across the café’s tabletop to clasp at her mother’s as it fidgeted with her own cup. “I’ll be safe, I promise. I won’t travel to any dangerous sides of town, I won’t travel at night alone. I’ll always call you before bed every night so you know that I’m still alive. I’ll be safe.”

The pinch of her mother’s dark brows was enough to suggest that she didn’t completely believe the promise. “I worry for you, Sorina. As a mother and as a woman. Be careful.”

Thumb stroked across the notch of her mother’s wrist. “I’m always careful. I’ll call you when I land.”


~​

Tonight would be the first night that her mother would be left waiting by the phone; a phone that would not ring. That thought alone was enough to urge her forward, to obey the shouts and the orders and the rough hands as she was shoved through a narrow space in the corridor. If she couldn’t do this for herself, she needed to try for her mother.

The corridor looked as if it as carved straight out of the rock face by hand, notches in the wall hollow enough for a candle or religious item to be nestled within the groove, setting the passageway in an ominous orange glow. A dark door lead off to the left, several of the naked girls being shoved and lead through the jagged archway while others were steered to the right. They cried in confusion and terror, unable to understand why they were suddenly being split, as if they’d found comfort in being kept as a herd.

They were sorting them.

Those with classically beautiful features were being forced to the left, while those who’d garner less attention were being palmed off to the right. There were three blondes and all of them were directed left; a sought after trait that came as a rarity in a country mostly of dark-haired people. Any with tattoos, scars, or piercings were deemed lesser, shoved into the arms of awaiting black-clad men to meet a less fortunate fate.

And then it was she standing before the man at the junction, smaller in frame than the rest but equally powerful in aura as he judged her naked form on the approach with hazel eyes over beak-like nose.

Right. They were going to send her right, she was sure of it.

While her skin had warmed to a tan beige, not all of her smooth skin had grown golden under the sun. She’d been blessed, or cursed as some would rather say, with a condition that left her with ghostly white patches across her skin that held no particular pattern at all. Vitiligo. She’d earn them less, having a defect such as this.

And yet his chin jerked in the direction of the left and she was shoved after the last blonde, deemed worthy of a higher price.

“Harekete geç.” Move on.

The narrow passageway, barely large enough to fit the hulking man at her back as he shoved her forward through the dimly lit gap, suddenly widened to a large, circular room. A flickering white light hung from above, it’s cable bolted to the ceiling and dome walls, swinging slightly on a breeze that otherwise felt absent. The girls cowered still, arms woven around their naked bodies as if they were trying to keep some sense of modesty. It was clear the men about them cared little for what pleasures of the flesh they could possess, instead tasked with a job that promised payment. Money could often sway a man more than sex, though she’d argue.

A metal rack of lingerie stood by one of the curved walls, and soon the colourful items were being plucked from the hangers by the smaller man who’d stood at the junction; clearly having followed them inside and deeming them more worthy of his attention than the rest. It was better for business, after all, to spend more effort in dressing up the higher selling merchandise than it was trying to sell the offcuts for an unreasonable price.

The girl beside her swore loudly, her brown eyes too large for her face as she cried out and made a sudden run for the corridor from which they’d entered. The blonde barely even made two steps towards it before the room echoed with the ear-splitting sound of a gun firing. A warm splatter struck her face, showering her in droplets of crimson that she refused to acknowledge, too focussed on keeping still so as not to draw the attention of the man by the lingerie, holding the smoking pistol.

“Aptal sürtük. Bize kırk bine mal oldu.” Stupid slut. She cost us forty thousand.

Was that all people were worth these days?

~​

The rain pattered against the cool glass of the inner city apartment, a little foggy from the coffee cup that stood upon its sill. A woollen blanket shifted, the couch groaning a little in protest. Nothing had been said for the last fifteen minutes, and the silence was growing uncomfortably heavy.

“Do you have anything to say?” A hand pressed against her temple, her elbow up on the arm of the chair as she reclined sideways almost awkwardly. Blue eyes watched his features closely, hoping for any kind of tell, but found nothing. “Anything at all?”

“What difference does it make when you are leaving me?”

The words cut through the air, the warmth of the apartment now seeming far less cozy and she visibly flinched and withdrew. “I had told you at the start, Jace, that I will not be staying here and that I will be leaving. If you believed you could—”

“Could convince you to stay? Could change your mind?” Hazel eyes turned upon her then, blank and emotionless as they capture her gaze. For a man so passionate, he’d dissolved into a creature unwilling to accept change or face truth. “Call me a romantic, but I actually believed you’d fall for me and want to stay.”

“Jace...”

He turned away from her. “You better get going. Your flight is in an hour.”

She remained there, upon the couch by the window for several minutes more before she finally rose to stand and brushed down the hem of her summer dress. Their last conversation had gone very different than she had imagined. He was a man always passionate, never afraid of anything, and he had always said that if she were to decide to leave as she’d promised that he’d see her off with a pussy full of cum for her to remember him by. People changed, she supposed, especially when faced with things they knew were coming but hope would never arrive.


~​

Black lace struck her chest, ironic considering the memory that had invaded her mind. She caught it with a hand, before it fell to the floor where the blonde lay slumped at her feet in a pool of growing blood. The lingerie tossed to her was simple enough, nothing thrilling and nothing special, but it was accented by a deep crimson garter belt that she knew would draw attention to the white splotches at her hip and waist. Blue eyes rose and met the hazel of the man by the rack, his gun now tucked back beneath waistband of his trousers as he smirked.

“Giy kızım ve utanma.” Put it on, girl, and don’t be shy.

Toes were growing sticky as blood seeped between them; warm and viscous as it began to congeal against the concrete. Gritting her teeth against the inside of her cheek was all that she could do to ignore the wave of nausea that struck her as she looked down at the lace within her hands, only to notice splattered brain matter in her peripheries. No wonder the girls about her were already scrambling to get dressed, even if their efforts were poor through vision blurred by streaming tears.

Throat bobbed in a swallow as she lifted one foot, slipping it through the black lace thong before she did the same with the other; careful as not to smear the drying blood across her skin anymore than she already had. Did they plan to sell her like this? A macabre painting of God’s work on her skin with a touch of their cruelty by way of blood? How much more would this add to her price?

She was dressed within another minute, the lace bralette struggling to contain the heavy flesh of her breasts that threatened to spill from the too-small cups. The garter was cinched tightly about her waist, halfway over a ghostly patch of white, squeezing at her insides. It wasn’t until the last girl was dressed in her blue transparent nightgown that they were then ushered from the room and down an adjacent corridor, wider than the first.

While the other girls were shoved ahead, her elbow was snatched suddenly, body slammed against the concrete wall of the tunnel as the hazel-eyes man leered before her. “You are going to earn us good money.” Calloused fingers plucked at a loose chocolate curl, pulling it before releasing. “Do not forget to smile.”

Her snarl echoed down the passageway. “Fuck you.”

Shoes scuffled over rough floor, one man half-turning backwards towards where they stood in the shadows, though he’d didn’t advance but simply paused and lingered until he was waved away. “You know,” a rough hand grabbed between her legs, the heel of his palm against the lace that pressed to the soft flesh of her pussy, “I might just bid for you so I can fuck you and cut you into little pieces.”

“Get your fucking hands off of me, you piece of—”

“Hey, sik kafalı!” The second man little ways down the passageway called, beginning to encroach on their space as he touched the butt of his own gun. “No handling the merchandise before sale.”

A calloused finger curled, shifting the lace upwards to press tightly between the plush folds of her core as if to prove a silent point. Only after a second more did his hand pull away, but not without a shove to her shoulder to get her walking once more and a firm spank to fleshy ass. The inside of her cheek was bitten harshly enough that it bled. She passed the second man who barely eyed her, who instead lingered behind to mutter words to the hazel-eyed man in warning.

Passageway met with metal stairs, leading upwards to a space she couldn’t yet spy. It glowed, however, an ominous deep red that reached down the stairwell towards her. Bare feet padded quietly in her ascension, before she paused at the top of took in the new space. It was nothing more than a holding bay, ringed with men who were ready to punish those who’d attempt to escape; as if they’d be foolish enough to try after the blonde. Still, she saw none of the faces of the girls who had been carted off to the right.

She stood by a wall, arms crossed beneath her bust as she kept to the shadows. Nothing good would come of catching their attention, and she did her best to meld into the gloom that clung to the peripheries of the space. A solid metal door stood in the centre of the far door, guarded by two men either side. One by one, the girls were dragged through that opening, the door never opening wide enough for her to see beyond, though she caught a glimpse of more red light and seedy darkness.

Then, there was no one left in the room but herself.

“Move.” A hand shoved at her bare shoulder, jolting her forward and away from the wall.

If she fought now, they’d likely kill her. If she didn’t, she’d likely be sold to the highest bidder who had a good chance of being the hazel-eyed man who watched her from afar with a greedy, sinful smirk. What was worse? Finding herself dead on the floor with a bullet between the eyes for disobedience, or being raped and tortured only to have her limbs cut from her body by him?

Weight shifted and elbow raised, the swing of her arm sent with such a force that when the sharp angle of her elbow struck solid cheekbone the room echoed with a *thwack*. It sent the man at her back stumbling backwards enough steps to give her some space to turn, and she did just that, launching herself at him as small hands moved for the pistol at his hip.

And though she waited the bullet to pierce through her skull, no such thing happened.

Instead, she was caught from behind by a set of arms, contained despite her sudden fury, as the man she’d hit clutched at the side of his face that was already beginning to bruise. They’d lost forty thousand from the disobedience of the blonde, it didn’t seem they wanted to lose any more.

“Get your fucking—!”

Hand clamped down over her mouth, holding her tightly as another man rushed forward. A pinch at the side of her neck was the only suggestion of foreign invasion, soon followed by the sharp sting as sedative flooded tissue and vein. They were smart enough, delivering an amount just right to sedate and subdue but still leave her standing upright and lively-looking.

The door opened and she was shoved through, her limbs numb and heavy as she stumbled upon the smooth black marble of what seemed to be a circular stage rimmed with red LED lights beaming skyward to ceiling. The smack of her feet sounded clumsy, though the sound wouldn’t reach the ears of those behind the glass. While she stood there, surrounded by a circle of glass panes with the door at her back, she blinked as her vision began to grow dark at the edges.

From behind the glass, a variety of figures sat within the ornate booths. Each was a seperate room, enclosed to ensure the identity of each person within would remain secret. Bidding in the world of human trafficking was anonymous for many reasons, jealousy playing a large part. Wine was free flowing, served by either average-appearing women who didn’t make the cut from the previous rounds of auctions or suited men. The chair, or chairs, within the booths were crafted of leather and mahogany, not a single expense spared upon the creation of this place. Within each arm of the main armchairs with winged backs, where the paying patrons would find themselves seated within, sat a black polished button rimmed with gold—a single press of this would send an electronic note to the auctioneer that said patron had bid.

A line of cocaine was served on a silver dish, offered to each patron as they were allowed to admire the merchandise before them; an unusual woman with dark curls, sultry blue eyes but with an odd olive complexion that broken with patches of ghostly white, barely hidden beneath the spray of crimson blood that decorated her chest and right cheek. To have something unusual was to have a statement piece, and the auctioneer knew this.

A light tone overhead announced the beginning of biddings as a baritone voice said; “Starting the bids at forty-eight thousand.”
 
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