The Windup Girl (44 page)

Eventually she makes Ploenchit and climbs the tower. Raleigh is waiting by the bar, as he always is, impatient. He glances up. "You're late. I'm fining you for that."

Emiko forces herself not to feel guilt, even as she apologizes. "So sorry, Raleigh-san."

"Hurry up and get changed. You have VIP guests tonight. They're important, and they'll be here soon."

"I want to ask you about the village."

"What village?"

She keeps her face pleasant. Did he lie about it? Was it always a lie? "The place for New People."

"Still worrying about that?" He shakes his head. " I told you. Earn up and I'll make sure you get there, if that's what you want." He waves her toward the dressing rooms. "Now go get changed."

Emiko starts to press again, then simply nods. Afterward. When he is drunk. When he is pliable, she will pry the information from him.

In the dressing room, Kannika is already pulling on her performance clothes. She makes a face at Emiko but doesn't say anything as Emiko changes and then goes out to get her first glass of ice for the evening. She drinks carefully, savoring the coolness and sense of well-being that overcomes her even in the swelter of the tower. Out beyond the roped-off windows, the city glows. From a height it is beautiful. Without natural people in it, she thinks that she could even enjoy it here. She drinks more water.

A rustle of warning and surprise. Women drop to their knees and press their foreheads to the ground in a
khrab
. Emiko joins them. The man is back, again. The hard man. The one who came with Anderson-sama before. She searches for signs of Anderson-sama, hoping that he will be there too, but there is no sign of him. The Somdet Chaopraya and his friends are already flushed and drunk as they come through the doors.

Raleigh rushes to them and ushers them into his VIP room.

Kannika slips up behind her. "Finish your water,
heechy-keechy
. You've got work to do."

Emiko stifles the urge to snap at the girl. It would be insane to do so. But she looks at Kannika and prays that when she knows the village's location that she will have an opportunity to pay the woman back for all the abuse she has delivered.

The VIP room is crowded with men. There are windows to the outside, but with the door closed, there is little circulation. And the act is worse than when Emiko is on the stage. Normally there are patterns to Kannika's abuse. Here though, Kannika leads her around, introducing her to the men, encouraging them to touch her and feel the heat of her skin, saying things like, "You like her? You think she's a nasty dog? Watch. You'll see a nasty one tonight." The powerful one and his bodyguards and his friends are all laughing and making jokes at the sight of her, at the feel of her as they pinch her ass and tug at her breasts, run their fingers up between her thighs, all of them a little nervous at this novelty of entertainment.

Kannika points to the table. "Up."

Emiko climbs awkwardly onto the gleaming black surface. Kannika snaps at her, making her walk, making her bow. Makes her totter back and forth in her strange windup way while liquor flows and more girls come in and sit with the men and laugh and make jokes and all the while Emiko is shown off, and then, as it must be, Kannika takes her.

She forces Emiko down on the table. The men gather round as Kannika begins her abuse. Slowly, it builds, first playing at her nipples, then sliding the jadeite cock between her legs, encouraging the reactions that have been designed into her and which she cannot control, no matter how much her soul fights against it.

The men cheer at Emiko's degradation, encouraging escalation, and Kannika, flushed with excitement, begins to devise new tortures. She squats over Emiko. Parts the cheeks of her ass and encourages Emiko to plumb her depths. The men laugh as Emiko obeys and Kannika narrates:

"Ah yes, I feel her tongue now."

Then: "Do you like it with your tongue there, dirty windup?"

To the men: "She likes it. All these dirty windups like it."

More laughter.

"More, nasty girl. More."

And then she is pressing down, smothering her, encouraging Emiko to redouble her efforts as her humiliation mounts, encouraging her to work harder to please. Kannika's hand joins Emiko's tongue, playing, taking pleasure from Emiko's subservience.

Emiko hears Kannika speaking again. "You want to see her? Go ahead."

Hands on Emiko's thighs, pushing them apart so that she is completely exposed. Fingers play at her folds, penetrate her. Kannika laughs. "You want to fuck her? Fuck the windup girl? Here. Give me her legs." Her hands close on Emiko's ankles, pull them up, exposing her completely.

"No." Emiko whispers, but Kannika is implacable. She pries Emiko's legs wide. "Be a good little
heechy-keechy.
" Kannika settles herself again over Emiko, narrating her degradation to the assembled men. "She'll eat anything you put in her mouth," she says, and the men are laughing. And then Kannika is pressing down hard on Emiko's face and Emiko can't see anymore, can only hear as Kannika calls her a slut and a dog and a nasty windup toy. Calls her no better than a dildo. . .

And then there is silence.

Emiko tries to move, but Kannika keeps her pinned, muffled from the world. "Stay there," Kannika says.

Then: "No. Use this."

Emiko feels men taking her arms, pinning her down. Fingers prod her, invade her, slide in.

"Oil it," Kannika whispers, excitement in her voice. Her hands tighten on Emiko's ankles.

Wetness at her anus, slick, and then a pressure, cold pressure.

Emiko moans a protest. The pressure lets up for a moment, but then Kannika says, "You call yourselves men? Fuck her! Look how she jerks. Look at her arms and legs when you push! Make her do her
heechy-keechy
dance."

And then the pressure comes back and the men are holding her down more tightly, and she can't get up and the cold thing presses again against her ass, penetrates her, spreads her wide, splits her open, fills her and she is crying out.

Kannika laughs. "That's right windup; earn your keep. You can get up when you make me come."

And then Emiko is licking again, slobbering and lapping like a dog, desperate, as the champagne bottle penetrates her again, as it withdraws and shoves deep into her, burning.

The men all laugh. "Look at how she moves!"

Tears jewel in her eyes. Kannika encourages her to greater effort and the falcon if there is any falcon in Emiko at all, if it ever existed, is a dead thing, dangling. Not meant to live or fly or escape. Meant to do nothing but submit. Emiko learns her place once again.

All night long, Kannika teaches the merits of obedience and Emiko begs to obey and stop the pain and violation, begs to serve, to do anything at all, anything at all to let the windup live just a little longer and Kannika laughs and laughs.

* * *

By the time Kannika is done with her, it is late. Emiko sits against a wall, exhausted and broken. Her mascara has run. Inside, she is dead. Better to be dead than a windup, she thinks. She watches dully as a man starts to mop the club. At the other end of the bar, Raleigh drinks his whiskey and laughs.

The man with the mop slowly approaches. Emiko wonders if he will try to mop her away with the rest of the filth. If he will take her out and throw her into one of the trash piles, leave her for the Dung Lord's collection. She can simply lie there, and let them mulch her. . . thrown away as Gendo-sama should have discarded her. She is trash. Emiko understands this now. The man pushes his rag mop around her.

"Why don't you throw me away?" she croaks. The man looks at her uncertainly, then turns his eyes to his work. Keeps mopping. She says it again. "Answer me!" she shouts. "Why don't you throw me away?" Her words echo in the open room.

Raleigh glances up and frowns. She realizes that she has been speaking in Japanese. She says it again in Thai. "Throw me away, why not? I'm trash, too. Throw me away!" The mopping man flinches and draws back, smiling uncertainly.

Raleigh approaches. Kneels down beside her. "Emiko. Get up. You're frightening my cleaning guy."

Emiko makes a face. "I don't care."

"Sure you do." He nods toward the door, to the private room where the men are still reclining, drinking and talking after their abuse of her. "I've got a bonus for you. Those guys tip well."

Emiko looks up at him. "They tip Kannika, too?"

Raleigh studies her. "It's not your business."

"They tip her triple? Give me 50 baht?"

His eyes narrow. "Don't."

"Or what? Or you throw Emiko into a methane composter? Dump me with the white shirts?"

"Don't push me. You don't want to piss me off." He stands up. "Come get your money when you're done feeling sorry for yourself."

Emiko watches dully as he stalks back to his barstool, gets himself a drink. He glances back at her, makes a comment to Daeng, who smiles dutifully and pours water with ice. Raleigh waves the water at her. Sets it on top of a purple sheaf of baht. He goes back to his drinking, seeming to ignore her staring.

What happens to windup girls who are broken? She never knew a windup girl who died. Sometimes an old patron did. But the windup girl lived. Her girlfriends lived. They lasted longer. Something she never asked Mizumi-sensei. Emiko hobbles to the bar, stumbles. Leans against it. Drinks the ice. Raleigh shoves the money over.

She finishes the ice water. Swallows the cubes. Feels their cold seeping into her core. "Have you asked, yet?"

"About what?" He's playing solitaire on the bar.

"Going north."

He glances up at her, then flips another set of cards. He's quiet for a second. "That's tough work. Not something you set up in a day."

"Have you asked?"

He glances at her. "Yeah. I asked. And no one's going anywhere while the white shirts are pissed off about the Jaidee massacre. I'll let you know when the situation changes."

"I want to go north."

"You already told me. Earn up, and it will happen."

"I earn plenty. I want to go now."

Raleigh's slap comes fast, but she sees it coming. It is fast for him, but not for her. She watches his hand proceed toward her face with the sort of servile gratitude that she used to feel when Gendo-sama took her to dinner at a fancy restaurant. Her cheek stings and then floods with puffy numbness. She touches it with her fingers, savoring the wound.

Raleigh looks at her coldly. "You'll go when it's damn well convenient."

Emiko bows her head slightly, allowing the well-deserved lesson to filter into her core. "You aren't going to help me, are you?"

Raleigh shrugs, goes back to his cards.

"Does it even exist?" she asks.

Raleigh glances over at her. "Sure. If it makes you happy. It's there. If you keep hassling me about it, it doesn't. Now get out of my face."

The falcon dangles dead. She is dead. Mulch for composters. Meat for the city, rot for gaslights. Emiko stares at Raleigh. The falcon lies dead.

And then she thinks that some things are worse than dying. Some things can never be borne.

Her fist is very fast. Raleigh-san's throat is soft.

The old man topples, hands flying to his throat, eyes wide with shock. It is all slow-motion: Daeng turning at the sound of the stool clattering to the floor; Raleigh sprawling, his mouth working, trying to suck air; the cleaning man dropping his mop; Noi and Saeng at the other side of the bar with their men waiting to escort them home, all of them turning toward the sound, and every one of them is slow.

By the time Raleigh hits the floor, Emiko is already bolting across the room, toward the VIP door and the man who hurt her most. The man who sits and laughs with his friends and thinks nothing of the pain he inflicts.

She slams into the door. Men look up with surprise. Heads turn, mouths open to cry out. The bodyguards are reaching for their spring guns, but all of them are moving too too slow.

None of them are New People.

30

Pai crawls up beside Kanya, stares down at the shadow village below. "That's it?"

Kanya nods and glances back at the rest of her squad, who have spread out to cover the other approaches to the shrimp farms where they breed bitter water-resistant prawns for the Krung Thep fish markets.

The houses are all on bamboo rafts currently grounded, but when the floods come, the houses will float, rising, as water and silt rushes across their paddy and ponds. Her own family on the Mekong used something similar long years ago, before General Pracha came.

"It was a good lead," she murmurs.

Ratana had been almost ecstatic. A link, a clue: fish mites between the third body's toes.

And if fish mites, then shrimp farms, and if shrimp farms then the only ones that would have sent a worker into Bangkok. And that meant shrimp farms that had experienced a die-off. Which led her to this Thonburi half-floating settlement with all of her men at the edge of the embankment, ready to raid in the darkness.

Down below, a few candles flicker inside the bamboo houses. A dog barks. They're all wearing their containment suits. Ratana insisted that the likelihood of a jump was slender, and yet still a worry. A mosquito whines in Kanya's ear. She slaps it away and draws her containment suit's hood tight. Starts to sweat in earnest.

The sound of laughter carries across the fish ponds. A family, all together in the warmth of their hut. Even now, with all their hardship, people still can laugh. Not Kanya, though. Something in her is broken, it seems.

Jaidee always insisted that the Kingdom was a happy country, that old story about the Land of Smiles. But Kanya cannot think of a time when she has seen smiles as wide as those in museum photos from before the Contraction. She sometimes wonders if those people in the photos were acting, if perhaps the National Gallery is intended to depress her, or if it is really true that at one point people smiled so totally, so fearlessly.

Kanya pulls her mask over her face. "Send them in."

Pai signals the men, and then her troops are all up and over the edges, coming down on the village, surrounding it as they always do before the burning begins.