Traffic

Part 6

I woke up in a room that was more like a jail cell than the crate. The walls were actually visible as well as the numerous people that were clammy, crowded, and covered in dirt from different crates, different past, different stories. A couple weren't as lucky as I was, or even Meg for that matter with bruises tainting almost every inch of their arm and then swollen features maxed on their faces. They were beaten into obeying. Feared in to conjoining. Nothing was to their mind but to saving their own lives. 

"Food? D-Do you have any food?" One of the women kept asking using a blanket that was torn and degraded as her only warmth in her jeans and a regular t-shirt like they hijacked her last summer or fall. Her shoes were gone, but the souls of her feet looked black and caked as if her skin made a natural one. She bent over to sit and her entire spine lit up like she hasn't eaten in weeks. Her Russian accent made her slightly harder to understand. "I just need a little."

All the food was left in the other crate. The women had walked around asking everyone multiple times and didn't even get a crumb. As I scanned the room, i noticed two things that Meg and I stood out on. We were the only people speaking English. We were the only people with American accents. I heard some Asian languages, Russian, french as if they were from Haiti, and bounds of other voices. 

Meg! Her blonde hair scattered the floor where she laid still passed out completely as I knelt by her side shaking her to wake get a response when I saw where they had struck her with the gun. "Wake up, Meg!" I kept yelling as people watched, but I needed a response in the slightest. "Meg! please!" 

She began to stir. Her hand instantly making its way to her forehead right where the gash was but even with the slightest gesture she would wince at the pain. That's when I realized that tears had gouged down my face. I was crying for someone I barley knew. 

"God, fucking sons of bitches." A grin grew on my face and tethered their as she began to sit up still a little dizzy from the blow. "I fell like circus animal."

Her eyes grew wide when she realized we weren't in the same crate, or a crate at all. In a hurry, she scrummed the ground for something to drink, but not even the anorexic women could find a drop.

"What the hell? They got us here and now were all suppose to die of starvation." uttering to herself. Meg is not the best at whispering. The only problem with her theory is there were no corpses in the room. The only smell came from the 40 unwashed live bodies that sat tangles and matted along the wall. "Bastards."

"That's not what this is."

"Then what the fuck is it?  Gas chamber, group grave, are we all buried alive in this cement coffin?"

I promptly ignored the last part because of the sky lights up top. "I think it's a holding cell."

"Holding for what?"

A heavy metal door swung open on the opposite side of the room as the two men from earlier walked in. And then Thomas stood in the back ground with his arms crossed. "The two Americans. Clean them up and then blonde can go ahead and be bargained. Brunette in my office."

"Shit--" I mumbled thinking about the entire conversation that will never be finished. 

"I swear, if they fucking--" The guard stepped on Megs leg as a snap came from one of her bones and she wailed at the pain. Her hands immediately fell to where the bruising began as he grabbed her upper arms dragging her up and forcing her to stand evenly on both legs. Searing pain in her left leg caused multiple tears as she could barley hold her eyes open through the winces as he took her shoulders and shoved her down again. "You disgusting pervert! Asshole! Dick!"

She continued to yell every insulting name, but he waited until she stuttered to step on her opposite leg. "Get up," he said retaining to Meg, "and lets go."

All the women around her watched, but they were all to afraid to act.

Including me.

The other guard put his shadow over me as I quickly took in my legs not wanting them broken. That didn't matter to him. He knew I was to scared to fight from the previous event with Meg. They used one to show all of us what they were capable of. Tugging at my hair a stood and stood still. His fingers ran to the bottom of my shirt as they circled at the hem of my jeans. His lips cam close to my ear as I felt a kiss on my cheek. "No wonder Thomas wants you."

My hand curled into a fist, yet I knew there was no use even thinking about fighting back. One example was plenty. 

His hand on the small of my back guided me. The door opened and steam hit me like a sauna as his hand lowered grabbing one of the belt loops of my jeans. 

"This is my favorite part."