Release In The Dark (DARK erotic romance series) (8 page)

So these are our costumes.
Dramatic, showy body paint which will dissolve in water.

I step out of my circle,
resisting the urge to rub my arms. I feel terribly cold all of a
sudden. Unlike in the Palace, there are no Matrons here to groom us
and help us with our costumes. Everything here is mechanized,
carefully programed and centrally controlled.

The girls stand just outside
their circles while the Warden carries out her inspection. When she
is satisfied, she stands at the front, her sharp eyes sweeping across
the room and says, “The patrons have been seated. You will
walk out into the Pit and stand in a straight line at the steps to
the stage. Listen for your cue from the host, Mr Toni. Go.”

Automatically, the girls form a
single line and start to file out of the room in silence. I stare at
the row of glowing, glimmering girls, my mind and body suddenly
frozen. This is it.

The Pit.

The Water Treatment.

A sudden surge of panic makes me
stagger back as the image of that towering column of water slams into
my mind. One by one, we will be sealed in and left to our own
devices.

If we can't hold our breaths
long enough, if our costumes take too long to fully dissolve, there
will be no escape for us. I stare at the silent line of girls,
acutely aware that some of them will die tonight.

These are their last few steps,
their last few breaths, their last few moments. Still they walk
steadily forward, without fighting their fate. Only their eyes
betray their fear.

“
Ana!” Pam whispers
urgently. “Let's go!”

I let her tug me into line
behind the dwindling row of girls. I am at the very end of the line.
Kylee is just one girl ahead of me, and Pam squeezes herself in
somewhere in the middle of the line. I am lined up behind that tall
brunette, Jennifer Young. With a start, I realize that we are lined
up in alphabetical order according to our last names. The roll call
each morning at breakfast—that was to let us know our places
during the night performance.

Ducking through the small door,
we emerge into the shadowy, flickering, deafening depths of the Pit.

Loud, booming music, pungent
cigar and cigarette smoke and red strobe lights assail my senses.

As I move along the edge of the
stage to stand in a silent, nervous line at the steps, I blink
against the blinding lights on the stage to see a small, rotund man
dressed in a white tuxedo and pink top hat strutting across the
stage. His face is thickly powdered and blue and red eyeshadow
shades his hooded eyelids.

“
...it is going to be a
mind-blowing, breathtaking experience for all. I am your host this
evening, Mr Toni.” His high-pitched voice pierces through the
booming music and echoes round the Pit. “The beautiful
beauties of the Red Lantern have arrived for your exquisite
entertainment. Please give a round of applause for these luscious
ladies of the Red Lantern!”

Mr Toni raises his arms and
claps loudly, but only a few slow, scattered claps are heard round
the Pit. I turn my head and squint at the booths. All of them are
occupied. The Pit is drenched in the stench of expensive cigars and
liquors, and I can see the red glow from their cigars and cigarettes,
and hear some low, gruff voices. The patrons of the Red Lantern are
all men of influence and power, military and business leaders. I can
see their shadowy figures and hear some low murmurs, but I can't make
out their faces or their words.

Undaunted, Mr Toni soldiers on,
laughing at his own jokes and performing a funny, awkward dance on
stage. He even does a couple of magic tricks with smoke and mirrors.

As Mr Toni pushes the show
towards the inevitable climax, I stare up at the glowing red lanterns
overhead. The shadowy booths in the Pit, visible only through the
dim red lights strobing across the entire floor, are in stark
contrast to the brightly illuminated stage. The stage is an
explosion of light, sound and spectacle with pulsing neon lights and
swirling multicolored smoke. I can't hear my own heartbeat above the
deafening music, let alone any conversation in the darkened room.

I rub my arms absently, feeling
the rough patterns of my painted costume. Even in the dim lighting,
all our costumes seems to glow and change colors, creating a surreal,
hypnotic effect.

“
And now, I present to
you—the Pillar of Passion!” Mr Toni declares with a
flourish.

All the lights dim at once. The
column start to rise from the middle of the stage, the water swirling
ferociously within it to create a spinning whirlpool. Zigzagged
lines of light strike the pillar, and the sound of thunder accompany
the rising of the column. Lights change the color of the water from
green to blue, then orange and red, as the whirlpool churns with
greater intensity. Water splashes from the top and flows down the
glass wall like a waterfall.

Once the column reaches its full
height, the lightning and thunder cease, and the lights in the Pit
dim further. The column is lit up like a lava lamp, with glowing
bubbles streaming steadily to the top.

“
Let us now welcome our
first bathing beauty, Kara!” Mr Toni smiles broadly and waves
Kara up.

Kara climbs the steps and stands
with her head bowed beside Mr Toni. The harness has already
descended, and Mr Toni helps her into it, all the while smiling and
cracking jokes.

He gives the wire a tug, and
blows a kiss to Kara as she is being reeled upwards. “Swim,
and be free, my love!” he calls out, spreading his pudgy arms.

Kara is released into the water,
and the top of the column seals shut. The music changes to a soft,
melodic tune, and the light ripples across the stage, as if trying to
create a magical underwater sensation. But the music, the lights and
Mr Toni's laughing commentary does nothing to relief me of my
overwhelming sense of dread and doom.

I watch Kara's emerald, scaly
body paint begin to change color in the water, and she becomes a
writhing, rippling, cloud of colors. Her costume flashes blue,
orange, yellow, red, the colors morphing and changing with increasing
speed. As I watch her widening eyes and clawing hands, I realize
that the colors are changing according to her fear. As she starts to
panic and her heart rate soars, the colors change faster and faster.
There are low chuckles and a few languid, lazy claps from the
audience.

I snap my head round and squint
hard into the smoke and shadows, but I can't make out a single one of
those cruel, sneering faces. My eyes flick back to the stage, and I
see Kara's eyes flutter rapidly. All the color has leeched from her
face, but her costume is only half gone. There are still large
splotches of body paint all over her body, covering her right breast,
the flat of her tummy and the length of her left leg.

Hurry up, hurry, hurry...

I stand frozen, watching the
paint fade little by little from her body.
Hold on, Kara, you can
do it!

At long last, every bit of her
body paint is gone. But Kara has lost consciousness. Her naked body
sinks slowly to the bottom of the column, her auburn hair waving like
seaweeds across her face.

I press forward, bumping into
the girl in front of me. Jennifer turns sharply and hisses at me.
“Hey!”

I hardly hear her. I can barely
breathe, my entire body shaking with cold and fear. “Come on,
come on, save her!” I whisper raggedly, my nails digging into
my palms.

Kara is left lying in the column
as the spotlights train on her. After a full minute, red smoke
shoots up from the vents around the stage, obscuring the column
completely. All the lights boom off for a heartbeat before strobe
lights cut through the darkness. Cheers and jeers erupt from the
patrons but their voices are swiftly drowned out by the rising,
screaming music. The smoke clears suddenly and the column is lit up
by a jagged crack of light, as though lightning has just struck that
gleaming, glass pillar.

I jerk forward, but Kylee shoves
me back with her shoulder. “Stay down,” she says angrily
in my ear.

I stagger back, my eyes wild.
Kara is gone.

There is nothing in that
swirling water but bubbles.

Lots and lots of bubbles.

But no Kara.

I open and shut my mouth
rapidly, a thin wheezing sound squeezing from my throat. Where is
she? What have they done to her? No, no no no!

Jennifer's hand flies to her
mouth and she stifles a squeak. I thud back into place behind her,
sick to my stomach.

Kara has drowned.

A male voice yells out, “Lousy
bitch! I bet good money on that one!”

Someone laughs.

Someone else claps.

I squeeze my eyes tightly shut
for an instant. These bastards! This is just a game to them. They
are losing and winning money, drinking and laughing as we drown in
front of them.

Give me strength. Give me
the strength to survive and do what I need to do in this hellish Pit.

I snap my eyes open with a
shuddering breath. Pam is craning her neck, squinting back towards
the end of the line at me.

I hear her voice in my head:
You have to be stronger than your mind.

Swallowing hard, I nod at her.

Raising my eyes towards the
stage once more, I blink at that tall, watery coffin that has just
claimed its first victim of the night. How many more will drown in
that transparent column before this night is over?

The bubbles are rising to
welcome the next girl, who is trying to stifle her hiccuping sobs as
she is being lowered into the water. Her costume is orange and red,
and as she shivers violently, the colors merge and flicker so that
she looks like a flame at the top of a giant, transparent candle. A
flame that is about to be extinguished.

She is dropped into the water,
and immediately the colors of her spray-painted costume flares out,
spreading through the water. The water swirls bright orange and red
around her. Tendrils of gold and silver unravel from her body, as
she spins wildly in the water. Her legs kick furiously, propelling
her to the top of the column. But the glass lid is securely in
place, sealing her in. Her palms press against the lid, as her legs
continue kicking and thrashing. The colors unraveling from her body
pool at her feet, creating the illusion of a tail. The top half of
her body is free of her body paint, and only her legs are sheathed in
the shimmering, dissolving paint. From where I am standing, she
looks like a mermaid.

She continues clawing feebly at
the glass lid, as her costume dissolves gradually from her legs. The
cocoon of colors creating the illusion of a mermaid tail sink to the
bottom of the glass column to reveal her thin, bruised legs.

Her costume has completely
dissolved. The glass lid slides open and what looks like a swing
descends from the ceiling. The swing is made up of two wires and a
leather strap. The girl gasps and grabs the leather strap. She
fumbles but finally succeeds in positioning the leather strap under
her buttocks. The wires lift and she sways from that makeshift
swing, coughing as tears stream from her eyes. Once her feet touches
the stage, she staggers off the swing and raises her arms high over
her head. There are catcalls and lewd comments from the audience.

The girl glances over to the
Warden, who is standing in the shadows at the side of the stage, and
at a signal, move awkwardly to the front of the stage and kneels down
with her hands behind her back.

I exhale painfully. The girl
has survived her water ordeal. I glance at the row of girls in front
of me, and at the back of Pam's head.

Will they survive? Will Pam
survive? Will I?

I am next. I count twenty-six
dripping, shivering girls kneeling around the revolving stage.
Thirteen girls didn't make it. Jennifer is just getting off that
leather swing, and I notice the long scar down the length of her
thigh as she strides past me to kneel at the other end of the stage.

I glance over my shoulder at the
darkened Pit. I am the last to go.

I smooth my clammy palms down
the textured, reflective paint on my body and let Mr Toni secure the
harness around my body with a tight, grim smile. His jokes have
ceased and he looks exhausted. With a tug on the wire, I am lifted
up towards the top of the column.

Fighting the rising nausea, I
squint at the lights and shadows of the Pit. Who is out there? Who
is betting that I will drown?

I arrange my features into a
smile. My lips start to quiver but still I stretch them into a wide,
insanely bright smile. I can't let them see how scared I am. It
will only heighten their excitement and pleasure.

I look down at the clear water
below my dangling feet. I blink hard as my toes dip into the water,
and start to hyperventilate. No, no, this won't do. Calm down,
Zoey, take deep breaths. Pace yourself.

Forcing deep breaths into my
lungs as I am being lowered deeper and deeper into the water, I
prepare my mind and body for the last breath I will take before the
water level rises above my mouth and nose.