GOING BOSTAL
3. Chasing Butterflies (part d)
"Oukaaaaaami-sama!" Anna's voice resounded confusingly through the narrow alleyways as Wolfson hurtled after her and her abductor. He had them in sight now – Anna kicking and screaming and pummelling the man with her small fists. Whether intentionally or not, her struggles were slowing her captor down. The gap was narrowing.
"Oww!" Anna's captor yelped as Anna fastened her teeth on his ear and bit down hard. "Bitch! Stupid bitch!" Unceremoniously, he tore her off his shoulder and dumped her onto the ground, hard, before turning around, wide-eyed, to find Wolfson on top of him.
Wolfson grabbed the sailor's tunic and threw him up against a nearby wall. The man gasped as the breath whooshed out of his lungs.
"Punch his lights out, Oukami-sama!" Anna urged him, climbing to her feet. "Whack him a bit!"
"In a second," Wolfson said, turning back to the sailor. "You. What's your name?"
"I... I ain't tellin' ya anything!" the sailor said, defiantly, and a bit stupidly. "Ooof!"
"What do you think, Chiisai-chan?" Wolfson asked, airily, his right fist still rammed up against the man's stomach. "He doesn't seem to want to cooperate."
"Beat him up real good!" Anna suggested.
Wolfson shrugged. "Whatever you say."
"No, wait!" the sailor gasped. "Ollie! Ollie! That's... my name..."
"That's a start," Wolfson said, agreeably, tightening his grip on the sailor's tunic and pressing him up higher against the wall. "Anna-chan, you see this pathetic little lump in his breeches here?"
Anna slipped forward to peer at Ollie's crotch curiously. "Hai, Oukami-sama?"
"I'm going to ask Ollie here some questions. When he doesn't answer them to my satisfaction, I want you to be unkind to it."
"Unkind?" Anna looked up at him, blinking innocently. "What do you mean, Oukami-sama?"
Wolfson grinned. "I'm sure you'll think of something, Chiisai-chan."
Anna smiled widely, bringing her fist up to her mouth and chewing thoughtfully at her thumbnail. "Hai, Oukami-sama," she said, gleefully.
"Uh, hey..." Ollie said, weakly. "She... she's just a kid, right? And it's not as if you lost her or anything. You got her back, right? I..."
"Chiisai-chan?" Wolfson prompted.
"Hai!" Anna nodded, and slammed the point of her elbow hard into Ollie's crotch.
"Aaaagh!" he groaned, his face creasing up in pain.
"Don't tempt me to let her do that again," Wolfson advised. "Because it won't take much provoking, believe me. Now... who put you up to this? It obviously wasn't your idea. You're not that smart, are you, Ollie?"
"Clancy," Ollie gasped. "Mister Clancy, from the Overflow Office down on the Docks. I don't... I don't do this sorta thing for him very often, mind you. He's got two right hands – Nezz n' Brink. It's just that they were busy with some other job tonight..."
"Tell me, Ollie," Wolfson said, conversationally, "where can I find this Clancy?"
"I dunno."
"Chiisai-chan?"
"I dunno!" Ollie screamed, as Anna balled her right hand into a small fist, grinning. "Nights like this, he takes the merchandise somewhere private. I dunno where! Only Nezz or Brink'd know. But I told ya, they're off after that Kara or Kana—"
"Kana-chan?" Anna repeated, shocked. "They're after Kana-chan? And Kurai-sama?"
"Dunno about no ‘Koo-rye-sma'." Ollie shrugged. "Short brown-haired girl with purple eyes and a master who ain't much taller."
Kana and Darkling...
"Where?" Wolfson snarled, shoving Ollie hard against the wall. "Where's it going to happen?"
"I don't know!" Ollie howled, as Anna beat at his crotch rhythmically with her fists. "I... uh... you'd..." He broke off, gasping weakly for air, his body recoiling under Anna's relentless assault.
"Chiisai-chan," Wolfson said, sternly. "Let him talk."
"Hai," Anna whispered, looking up at him and biting her lip forlornly. "Kana-chan..."
"Brink n' Nezz have their own place down on the Docks. Manticore Lane. Down past the main cargo docks and headin' towards the market district. Next ta Rose's tattoo parlour, on the left. They'd know where ta find Clancy!"
"Fine." Wolfson dropped Ollie back to his feet. As the sailor breathed a sigh of relief, rubbing tentatively at his groin, Wolfson spun and floored him with a vicious uppercut.
Somewhat surprisingly, Anna didn't cheer. She didn't do anything at all. She just looked up at Wolfson, her eyes wide with anxiety. "Kana-chan?" she asked, her voice pathetically small. "Kurai-sama?"
"I'm going to find them," Wolfson said, adjusting the hang of the longsword on his belt. "But I'll take you back to the inn first. I want you to—"
"No!" She grabbed his arm, clinging to it tight. "I'd be worried! I want to help you find them! I'm coming with you!"
Wolfson smiled despite himself, looking into her pleading eyes. He reached out and gently stroked her cheek with the back of his fingers. "To be honest, I'd rather have you with me as well," he said, after a moment. "I've already almost lost you once tonight. I don't want to run that risk again."
She smiled back, rubbing her cheek blissfully against his hand. "Then let's go, Oukami-sama."
"Right," Wolfson said. "Let's hope we find them before they find Kana and Darkling."
Hand in hand, the two of them ran off into the night.
I trace your name...
She'd lost track of everything. She couldn't feel her body anymore – it was just a throbbing mass of pain. She'd lost her balance hours ago, and now she was just hanging limply from the rope, her wrists raw and chafed from the friction, feeling like they'd give way at any moment. If only they would. If only... if only this would end...
Time. Hours. Minutes. What did any of it mean? Where was she; how long had she been here? There was nothing but the pain of the springwood switch lashing against her skin; the pain of her tormentor's fingers and lips touching her everywhere; and worst of all, the pain in her heart.
She'd failed Oniichan. He'd been attacked because of her. He was probably still lying there in the street because of her. He... he might even be dead because of h—
No. No, just the pain. Just the dull submission to Clancy's invasive touch. He was stripping and abusing her soul the way he'd stripped and abused her body. There wasn't a part of her that hadn't felt the sting of the switch, making her scream and beg and plead for it to stop. But it hadn't ended, not when she chose. Only when he chose.
In between sessions with the switch, as the pain ebbed and dulled a little, he'd spoken kindly to her, and moistened her lips with water, and kissed her. He'd lavished her aching breasts with soft kisses as well, while running his hands all over her tormented body, making her twitch weakly at the pain. And his fingers had played between her legs, making her wet despite the awful reality of the situation, and he had stroked her and soothed her and made the warmth spread upwards from her groin through her stomach. He'd made her body strain unwillingly for release – a release he never allowed her. No, he would leave her then, at the precipice, and start beating her with the springwood switch again.
After an eternity of this, Kana's mind had broken free. She was drifting somewhere above her body, and the only thing she could hear were the words of a song that she'd known a long time ago.
...with my finger and I smile...
Her lips moved silently in time with the words. He hadn't noticed. The switch came swishing down, lashing her right nipple. She screamed raggedly, her throat burning.
...with an aching in my heart that still...
The words... the words were fading. What did they mean? Her mind grasped desperately at them, but they were falling apart. She was falling apart as well.
How much longer? Oh, please, just make it end...
Swish. The switch seared a line of white-hot pain across her thighs.
...somehow... somehow keeps me... warm...
Kana screamed again, momentarily losing track of the words. Was she... was she going to die? Was he going to keep going until he made her heart burst?
There was no future. There was no past. There was only now.
But still her lips moved, stubbornly. There was someone in her heart. And she'd hold onto him for as long as—
Her back arched convulsively as it felt the merciless lash of the switch. She flopped sideways, sobbing helplessly. Unable to escape.
Please grant my hope... my... my tiny hope...
"We've come a long way." She felt wet fingertips on her lips, dribbling water into her mouth. She gulped at it eagerly, pathetically, even as her cramping body shrank at the renewed touch of his fingers. She wasn't here. That was the answer. She was... somewhere else entirely.
Why was she holding on? What was she hoping for? It would be so much easier to... to give in. To pretend compliance.
But he would know. He could see inside her soul. And he wouldn't stop until her spirit was subjugated to him completely.
The lash... already? Again? What had... where had the time gone? She wasn't ready. She—
But the switch was beating her again. And the tears were streaming down her face.
...before it fades... away...
Oniichan.
As the two thugs lunged at him, Darkling burst into motion. Dodging to one side, he sent the first tough reeling with a deft hook to the jaw. His left foot lashed out behind him to catch Jerl in the chest, sending the Blood Mongrel staggering backwards into a table of drunk patrons. Whirling, Darkling caught the second thug's clumsy attack on one upraised forearm and slammed his knee into the thug's stomach. As the thug crumpled forward with a muffled ‘oof!', Darkling drove his right elbow hard against the side of his head, sending him down for the count.
Jerl was still busy trying to extricate himself from the party of sailors he'd crashed into, leaving Darkling free to deal with the first thug, who was climbing warily to his feet, keeping his eyes on Darkling. They watched each other grimly for a moment, circling for position. The Blood Mongrel broke first, charging forward with a guttural snarl.
Darkling remained stock-still until the last possible second, then met the thug's attack with a staggering one-two combination, a flurry of punches that rocked the Blood Mongrel back on his heels. Almost contemptuously, Darkling spun and brought his left elbow around in a vicious arc that terminated abruptly against the thug's face, smearing his nose across his cheek. Another savage backhanded blow sent the thug crashing to the floor.
The sound of footsteps alerted Darkling to the fact that Jerl was back in the fight. What was more, the Blood Mongrel had decided to be a spoilsport and pull a knife. That was no fun at all.
Darkling avoided Jerl's initial thrust easily, ducking aside with minimal effort and bringing his stance around to address the Blood Mongrel.
"That's not nice, you know," he said, conversationally, as he evaded another set of frantic stabs from the short, wide-bladed knife. "All I wanted was a chat."
"Darkling!" Gretchen screamed, from behind Jerl. "Be careful!"
Jerl's eyes narrowed. His grip tightened on the knife, and he started backing away, taking hasty steps towards the back of the taproom.
"Oh, for Lambult's sake," Darkling sighed, "don't be stupi—"
"Gotch—!" Jerl jeered, reaching out for Gretchen with his knife-hand, then pulling it back with a scream. "Aaagghh!"
The knife went clattering to the floor, along with three of Jerl's fingers.
"Pulling a knife is one thing," Darkling growled, stepping forward with his katana's bloodied edge now poised against Jerl's cheek. "Trying to take hostages... Well, that's just plain naughty."
"Wh–what do you want?" Jerl gulped, his eyes wide with shock. He clutched his maimed hand to his side, the steady flow of blood staining his tunic crimson.
"I told you." Darkling pressed the blade against Jerl's cheek slightly, drawing blood. The Blood Mongrel was shaking now, almost pathetically.
The image flashed through Darkling's head again – in the last moment before he'd lost consciousness, he'd caught a glimpse of one of his attackers... Red scarf. Crossed sabres. A round, leering face.
"The dwarf. The stupid bald git with the red scarf. Where can I find him? Tell me, you bastard." The katana's blade sliced deeper into Jerl's flesh, carving a flap out of the Blood Mongrel's cheek. Blood began to flow freely down the cold steel. "Tell me," Darkling repeated, icily. "Or you're going to leave here in pieces."
Next: A walk in the dark