Dawn stared in confusion at where the girls had stood. Crystal,
Wade, Danielle and Pamela were simply gone, like a puff of wind
disperses smoke. The handcuffs that had held them swung silently,
still wrapped around the safety railing to which they’d been
secured, and the ropes that had held Danielle and Crystal’s ankles
lay inert upon the ground. Leigh, Andrea, Monique and Nicole still
knelt quietly in their assigned places, and Kate still hung weary
against the pillar, but the new girls were gone, as if they’d never
existed.
“Where …” Dawn whispered.
His voice came from behind her right ear, close and intimate.
“They’re back in their seats, panties back where they began, around
their hips, watching as the Clones begin their attack.”
Dawn spun slowly, her eyes wide. “You sent them back?”
He nodded. “Safe and sound. They’ll never remember this place. Not
the sex. Not the pain. Not even the taste of their own panties.
Scout’s honour.”
She doubted if he’d ever been a boy scout, though he obviously knew
his knots.
“That easy?”
He shrugged. She didn’t know whether to interpret that as a shrug of
affirmation, or a shrug of denial. She shivered. She hadn’t even
sensed when he’d released them. When she’d stood up, with his help,
at the top of the escalator, the girls had hung here, naked and
moaning. When she’d looked up from her runners, at the base of the
staircase, the girls were gone.
She sighed, not understanding, and simply watched as he moved around
her and crouched near Leigh. Idly, she wondered if he could sense
her, like a bird can sense the cat. What might happen if she
stepped forward, aiming her runner at the back of his head?
She sighed again. She wouldn’t attack him — couldn’t risk it. Not
yet. She needed to know more.
She took a step backward, noting that he stiffened at the sound of
her runners against the marble, but then he bent back towards Leigh,
his hand and fingers working quietly behind her back.
Dawn hoped that he wasn’t tightening her bonds.
<—===***===—>
The girls didn’t rise from their knees, even after their arms were
freed. Leigh knelt quietly with an expression of resignation upon
her face. Dawn watched the girl, as her lips began to curl in a
grimace of pain that quickly spiralled into an expression of agony.
The girl struggled to hold still, even her fingertips quivering with
effort resting on her thighs.
“Ahhhhhh,” Leigh moaned.
Dawn glanced at him, and he nodded to her. Dawn stepped forward,
crouching in front of Leigh. To the side, she was aware of the
others, slowly falling into the same pattern as Leigh. Andrea began
to moan, and Monique followed but a moment later, her voice quickly
rising in a scream resembling that of a cat in pain. Nicole, alone,
seemed to be able to suffer whatever agony had been inflicted upon
them. Dawn envisioned electric implants, perhaps deep inside
shooting sparks into their nerves. She could see the pain in
Nicole’s eyes, but the girl merely pressed her lips together and
bore it silently.
“What’s wrong,” Dawn whispered. She wished fervently that her hands
were free. She wanted to gather the naked girl into her arms and
stroke her.
Leigh looked up, as if surprised to see Dawn there. Instead of
answering, she hissed.
“It’s you. Oh, God, it’s you.”
Dawn recoiled as if stung, misunderstanding the words. She backed
away, sure that somehow her proximity was causing the girl’s agony.
Leigh shook her head, and cried out weakly.
“Pins. And. Needles. Our arms. They’ve been tied like that since
this morning. Christ.”
And suddenly, Dawn knew, her own arms tingling in an approximation
of Leigh’s pain. When the ropes had released, Leigh’s nerves had
awakened after a long slumber, driving bolts of lightning into her
arms. Kate had screamed, too, when he’d untied her arms, and Dawn
hadn’t understood. Oh, God, he’d moved Kate’s arms relentlessly
tying her to the pillar, even as her nerves had awakened, and she
had screamed. Dawn moaned.
After a few minutes, Leigh began to settle, and she slowly raised
her head, tears shining in her eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered.
“For what?” Dawn had settled into a cross-legged pose in front of
Leigh, helplessly watching as the girls worked through their
internal discomfort. It would ease for all of them, like it did when
one slept awkwardly on her arm, and discovered in the middle of the
night, not an arm, but a dead piece of wood attached to her
shoulder. Eventually, the pain absorbed into relative normalcy.
“Sorry that you got dragged into this. You were free, weren’t you?”
Dawn felt tears well up, but she willed them back. Slowly, she
nodded. It wasn’t the girls’ fault she was handcuffed here. Not at
all. It was ironic really. If it weren’t for her, Dawn mused, Leigh
probably wouldn’t have been tied like she was, her pain used to
drive her out. She couldn’t find the words to express her thoughts.
Not without crying herself.
“I’m sorry,” Leigh repeated. Her eyes then dropped back to her
knees, as Dawn felt a light touch upon her shoulder. The Timeman
had come to collect her.
<—===***===—>
“Water. And whatever candy bars you find.”
“Steal them?” Leigh asked lightly.
“Do you have any money?”
The girl shook her head slowly, and then began to walk away, towards
the escalator. Dawn watched as the naked girl’s feet whispered
across the marble, dodging nimbly around frozen shoppers, and
protuding benches.
What was preventing her from running? The ropes had been removed
from her arms, and she was relatively pain free. The Timeman wasn’t
levelling that damn gun at her back. The other girls watched her
disappear up the corridor. Even after she was out of sight, Dawn
could sense her, walking more slowly after she rounded the corner,
her smaller tennis ball spinning steadily as she moved away.
Dawn was about to turn and ask him what kept Leigh from running, but
it came to her before the question passed her lips.
Consequences. Even when free, the girl wasn’t. Her range of motion
was limited to whatever he allowed her, freezing and unfreezing her
world to allow her motion, or restricting it to keep her close.
Idly, Dawn wished it was so easy for her, but would she use it the
way he did? She didn’t think so, but absolute power …
She shivered.
It wasn’t the only reason that Leigh would return. Innately,
somehow, the Timeman understood this, even more than his control
over her physical world. Even if Leigh were as free as Dawn was, in
terms of controlling her own time bubble, she would no sooner
abandon the girls to the Timeman, than she would kill her own
mother. Leigh would return with what he’d asked of her, as surely as
the sun set in the west and rose in the east. To abandon Kate, to
abandon Andrea, to abandon Nicole and Monique unthinkable. Dawn
felt it tug at her own heart. She might escape, but she wouldn’t. No
more than Leigh would.
Everyone was silent, except for the occasional sigh from Kate. The
patter of bare feet brought Dawn’s head up, as Leigh rounded the
corner, Leigh’s eyes bright and happy, the expression almost of a
child who had completed a task.
In her arms, against her bare breasts, she cradled a mound of
chocolate bars, and three bottles of Evian water, condensation
dotting the clear plastic. She bent as she approached, and Dawn had
the crazy image that the girl was bowing. The food tumbled from her
arms to lay in a disorganised heap in the middle of the bench to
which Kate had been formerly leashed. Leigh backed away, and
returned to her position. She didn’t kneel, but stood easily, her
hands brushing at her naked thighs. When the Timeman didn’t move
from his position, leaning against another pillar, Leigh caught his
eye.
“Please, can we eat and drink? Please?”
He laughed softly, and tilted his head in a silent question.
“It’s been a hard morning,” Leigh said. Her admission that he’d
managed to tax them seemed to pain her further. “We’re hungry and
thirsty. I’ll beg you, if you wish.”
He waved her off, and she bowed her head. Dawn wasn’t sure, but she
thought that the girl might be silently weeping, her bare shoulders
shaking slightly.
“It’s inhumane,” Dawn said quietly. “Why won’t you let her eat?”
He smiled and pushed himself from the pillar. He approached Dawn,
and she willed herself to stand there, not backing away from him. He
might slap her, or strike her more forcefully for impertinence, for
all she knew. She cringed, but gently, he merely touched her
shoulder. Obediently, she turned herself around, presenting her
denim clad bottom to him. She felt his fingers slide down her sleeve
and then almost caress her bound wrists. A click reached her ears,
and suddenly she was free again, her hands parted, and she brought
them in front of her, inspecting her fingers. It felt nearly
deliciously good to be free of the cuffs. She massaged her wrists
slowly. Faint red marks upon her skin reflected where the steel had
held her. She turned to him, forgetting for a moment his refusal to
let the other girls eat.
“Thank-you,” she said.
He nodded, acknowledging her.
“They can eat after Kate. Kate needs the energy more.”
“Are you going to release her?”
“In a while. For now, you can feed her. She needs to eat more than
she needs to be free of the ropes.”
Dawn swallowed, and stared at him, her eyes questioning. He nodded
once, and she nearly ran to the bench, gathered a bottle of water,
and a hersey milk chocolate bar. Her own stomach growled, as she
rose and began to walk towards Kate.