Descent Into Darkness (25 page)

CHAPTER
L – Red Raw

Amber had a plan and it would deal with Red in such a sweetly poetic way. Red had abandoned her to follow that bitch. She had strode away with barely a backward glance to follow Raven with such myopic devotion that she had crossed all boundaries of morality and decency. Red had clearly lost herself and Amber would gladly press the reset button for her to start again, this time alone. With that contented thought, Amber set to work.

It’d been a while since she’d tried it and even then it had only been on rare occasions where the job had been simple. ‘Probably six years,’ Amber thought as she took the needle from the sterile package, but now it was time again. It was during her rebellious late teens where she’d veered this way and that, looking for her direction. She’d found it in needles, tattoo needles to be precise and drawing the ink into the gun and fitting a fresh needle, old memories gushed back.

She’d worked so hard, studied those long lonely hours to the detriment of more than herself. The course could have been designed for Amber, a mix of linguistics and law that she’d eyed for almost four years. Her grades had been achieved, more than achieved, her application had been accepted and she planned with the enthusiasm of a puppy to follow something that had long been her destiny.

Timing though had been the chief conspirator and the cutbacks needed to be made. First, the law faculty was amalgamated with the university in the city. No big deal but when the linguistics lab was then closed to save costs, the door to her future slammed shut in her face. So much planning, so much effort but Amber’s best laid plans had been shown to be nothing more than glass and shattered.

Sure, other places had been offered. None though captured either her imagination or her heart. Her parents had been so worried as she lost not just a university place but also her purpose.

Waking each morning with the same bleak future ahead, one pointless day merged with another, until one Saturday had seen her wake with an idea that had her dress quickly and head into town.

It was more an act of rebellious protest than anything, rebellion against the establishment that had invited her in and then shown her the door. A tattoo wouldn’t give her anything back but it would be a visible sign of the frustration she felt. So she’d gone there determined to see through her mini-mutiny.

The sound pulled her up short and Amber found herself standing in front of the counter looking at a bored receptionist with long straggly purple hair. She’d been asked what she wanted. Amber should have asked for the tattoo she’d planned but the sound of the gun prompted her to seek out another outlet and, seeing the ‘Help Wanted’ sign on the counter, Amber had asked for a job.

It wasn’t ideal, far from it, but it gave her the independence in both spirit and finance to start to break free from childhood confines and strike out on her own. She soon moved from home and into the small studio apartment above the shop. It hadn’t lasted long before she’d been kicked out as the parlour struggled with its debts. Fortunately, the artist she’d assisted soon found work elsewhere and called her, saving Amber from the ignominy of a return to parents who poured scorn on her new freedom.

It was a tenuous freedom but it was during the time she’d been working in the third parlour that Amber had met Red. She had been sitting in a park for lunch and a casual conversation had developed into much more. Red was different then. Her bust was smaller, hips a little broader and her confidence needed to be nurtured back to health following the trauma of a recently failed marriage.

They’d started as lunch buddies but, two lonely girls in a strange town, they had stumbled into more and, within weeks, shared a bed. Confidence slowly rebuilding, Red had pushed her reconstruction. Daily visits to the gym were the norm but soon she had grown weary of the tiringly slow process. So she’d saved everything she could, often skipping meals to pay for the knife that sculpted and shaped what the gymnasium struggled to reach.

Amber now looked at the woman below her. The Red she’d met and nursed through her emotional pain had gone, replaced by the version unconscious at her feet, the sycophantic disciple of a psychopath. With a whispered goodbye Amber started to work, first cutting away the prone woman’s leather catsuit to get the access she needed.

== ~ ==

It was on the third letter that she stirred and Red’s eyes shot open as scratching fire seared her abdomen. “Easy there.” The soothing words from Amber bought her another letter while the woman drifted, her body a blank canvas to revenge.

The voice was familiar and so Red instinctively eased, relaxing in protective arms. “Drink,” came the next instruction and, with a cup raised to her lips, Red drank the drugged water and was soon ushered back into a deep sleep.

== ~ ==

Amber had no need to work with the same urgency now, Red wouldn’t cause any problems for several hours, but she wanted to give whatever help she could to Jade. She dispensed with the usual care such a job would demand to push it through. Somehow care didn’t seem fitting as she’d received none herself and the rushed scrawl of untidy letters seemed somehow right.

She hadn’t kept the colour within the boundaries but then she didn’t really care about that either and, standing back to get the full effect, Amber nodded in satisfaction.

Red was one of those annoying women who frequently wore crop tops. Even more annoyingly, she also made them look good with her flat stomach and softly sculpted definition. In future perhaps she would think twice. The tattoo had been carefully placed to ensure that and the word chosen was perfect.

‘CHEAP’ was what was permanently etched. All too cheap had been the relationship Red had simply thrown away with such little care. Amber tilted her head. It doubly fit as Red’s body was anything but, expensively honed by investment in both gym time and surgeons. The new look brought a smile of wicked satisfaction to Amber’s face.

It was the prelude to what Red would experience later and Amber dispensed with the normal protective aftercare of petroleum jelly and bandages to guard against potential infection. If it got infected then karma had determined it and first packing her tools away, Amber tried to drag Red into the cage where she would spend her first night branded.

Try as she might, with a damaged knee that would take no pressure, moving the slumbering woman was beyond Amber. Red was a dead weight. She couldn’t do it alone but fate was smiling kindly, bringing the friendly but panicked face of Dan emerging hurriedly from the dressing area.

“The gym Miss Amber!” he babbled. “It’s Miss Mela!”

Amber swore. “Help me first!” Together they stuffed the woman into the cage to the left of the large bed, locking the door against her folded legs. With an uncomfortable night awaiting her, Red was secure.

“Go, Dan, go!” ushered Amber. “Quick as you can.” Dan hurried off back down the narrow back stairs with the limping Amber following as fast as her injured knee would allow.

CHAPTER LI –
Two Into One Doesn’t Go

Raven doubted that Mela had grown the balls to come back alone. Raven was too streetwise, too intelligent to consider for a moment that she had, and her senses were alerted to other possible dangers.

She was back in the familiar territory of survival. It had shepherded her through dark times when she had no choice but to fight for her very existence. It came naturally and Raven slipped comfortably back into a former persona, finding a dark protective corner and sheltering there while she gathered her thoughts. She ran though events so far, piecing together the puzzle.

Mela in the house would probably mean Jade was too. Was she already aware of Immelmann’s demise? She couldn’t be. Just coincidence. There were only four present. She knew she could trust the sycophantic Red and she had just left Katarina in the gym. Immelmann was dead and she was the fourth.

If Jade learnt of his death it might be different but for now she was just another pathetic dominant wannabe. Raven needed to secure what was now hers once and for all. Jade was weak. She would be easy to deal with.

Raven sifted through her memory of the morning, the playback being scrutinised detail by detail for any further hints toward what was unfolding. The thud she had heard earlier, what was that? It sounded as if it was quite a distance away so was difficult to decipher. It could have been a scuffle or something as innocent as a servant knocking over a chair. She would have to be on her guard though, just in case.

Raven had a decision to make. She could find and alert Red - that would improve her own odds but that was quickly dismissed. It would take time, risking the discovery that Mela had already been dealt with. Surprise would be lost and looking for help didn’t suit. She was Raven, after all. Nobody would stand between her and what she wanted - she needed no-one’s help.

Right now, Raven had to cement her newly won primacy of place. Jade was trying to put herself in the way of that. If truthful to herself, other than that she was her discarded predecessor, Raven knew little of her. She had a dominant demeanour at the ball, but to Raven it was fake.

“Weak,” Raven reminded herself, half assured yet still half wary. Jade had been taken down once and would be again. If she was here then sooner rather than later. Yet it would be foolish to dismiss her obvious spirit, and Raven headed to a place where she knew the odds would be in her favour.

== ~ ==

She was stealthy this time, her lesson well learnt. Nobody could possibly have heard and as she approached the observation room, Jade was confident that nobody had seen. Dan had been despatched to help Amber so she had just two concerns – find Mela, find Raven.

She’d checked three likely rooms on the way down and, barring the dramatic change of décor from her time in the house, all looked normal. There was no sign of Mela at all and Jade was becoming increasingly concerned.

Even from their all too brief time together, it was clear that Mela remained damaged goods. Recovering? Sure, but still damaged and she wouldn’t have the strength to stand up to Raven so soon.

Coming to the door to the gym Jade paused with her hand on the handle, listening to the whirring and pounding rhythm from within. Her sense of urgency was still pushing her on too fast so she took that moment to gather herself and slowly leant on it, flinching as the catch slid back. With her shoulder, Jade eased the door carefully forward and peered inside.

== ~ ==

Her thighs burnt like molten lava but Katarina knew she couldn’t slacken her pace. At first it had been easy but the constant bounce of the chain from the piercings was no longer pleasant. The cross weave on the treadmill belt bit the soles of her feet and she was quickly approaching the point of exhaustion. It was more subtle than Raven’s usual sadism but it hurt nonetheless, and tears dripped as Katarina pushed on.

A movement caught her eye, making her stumble as she turned her head. Pain shot from her nipples and gritting her teeth, she pounded on.

Set again, Katarina looked at the door. In her exhaustion, she thought for a moment that Raven had changed before realising it wasn’t her. It was the woman from the grand ball, Jade, and as she came into the room, Katarina tried to make sense of it.

Dressed in a jet black latex catsuit, Jade’s look was very different to the classic gown of the night before, though no less stunning. Her boots shouted of practicality rather than sophistication and the belt cinched tightly around her waist made her purpose obvious, adorned as it was with equipment that smacked of forcible control. A functional look but in an overtly sexual way.

== ~ ==

Jade’s hand rested next to the treadmill’s controls. How to end this ordeal by exercise? She stabbed at the buttons, trying to stem the relentless churn of the belt. A stumble said that the woman was close to collapse but, try as she might, it wouldn’t slow or stop, the control lay elsewhere.

Jade moved quickly to the chains holding the woman onto the machine. From Mela’s description this was Katarina, the woman she had seen at the grand ball, the woman she was this time here to help. The chains were padlocked and their anchor points well fixed. They would be impossible to remove without causing too much damage and Jade looked into the near sightless eyes of someone who could take little more.

“Observation room, behind mirror,” Katarina panted, using precious breath before putting her head down to drive on. Jade looked. The door was well hidden but sure enough it was there.  She ran over, wrenching the handle down and flinging the door open the second she reached it.

The sight in the room though was the last she expected. Wrapped up in her need to help, she’d thrown caution to the wind and forgotten the dangers. There, right in front of her, lay Mela, hogtied and gagged.

== ~ ==

Mela squirmed and mewled but could do nothing to provide an effective warning. She had watched as her newly ordained Mistress had tried to help Katarina and her heart had sunk as she’d seen Jade rush towards the door.

Mela could also see the smirking Raven crouching behind it, prepared, ready to strike. All would soon be totally lost.

== ~ ==

Jade didn’t see it coming, distracted by the sight of Mela trussed like yesterday’s meat. As Raven slammed her body into the opening door, Jade was tossed heavily aside, crashing into the frame, injuring the arm she flung out to break her fall.

The door was drawn back. Stunned, Jade didn’t move and it was slammed into her a second time, and then a third.

As it came at her a fourth time, Jade still had the wherewithal to fall back into the gym, causing the door to slam shut so hard the mirrored glass shattered, raining a thousand dangerous shards over her.

Jade shielded her eyes and got to her feet but before she could react again, Raven leapt on her, screaming like a banshee as she tore talon-like nails into her hated predecessor’s cheek, pressing on the sharp slivers of glass between them. Her legs quickly wrapped around Jade who, unable to resist, took punch after punch painfully into her kidneys.

All those lessons, all that teaching and yet her martial skills were no use against the feral frenzy of Raven who was attached too tightly to dislodge. Each blow sucked air from her and, gasping, Jade first staggered then fell with Raven on top.

A hand snatched at Jade’s hair, agony exploding in her scalp as her head was yanked backwards and a knee driven down into her chest. Stars swam into her vision. She had to fight. She couldn’t go out like this and remembering her training, Jade jabbed the heel of her hand sharply upwards in the area she hoped her assailant’s face would be.

== ~ ==

Though the driven blow shocked her, in the nick of time Raven turned her face, saving her from a broken nose. It hurt though, connecting with her right cheek with a crunching force. It caused Raven to pause for a split second, which was all her victim needed.

A knee quickly followed, snapped up between her legs and then a second more focussed punch hit her squarely on her left breast. ‘God that hurt,’ Raven’s mind flashed.  A second punch landed on the exact same spot – ‘Oh God, that’s good.’ Perhaps she would keep Jade for sport - beat her, allow her the hope of retaliation, and then crush her.

Raven threw her head forward, contacting directly against the woman beneath with a ringing thud. It wasn’t ideal but it staunched the rebellion enough for Raven to straighten for a moment, a brief respite in their struggle. She took a breath, her body buzzing with adrenaline and exertion but also pleasure. She was about to resume when there was an unexpected movement to her side and the tide turned again.

== ~ ==

Jade saw the movement at the same time, welcoming the distraction that Dan’s arrival provided. With absolute force, Jade drove her hand upwards again, this time connecting perfectly with the nose of the woman above her.

The blood told Jade that her aim was true and her training told her that her victim would be dazed and sightless. “The treadmill control! In the Observation Room!” Jade screamed out directions before throwing a stunned Raven off to the side. She landed heavily, hands clasped to her nose.

“I can’t see the control Miss Jade, it’s so complicated!” Dan shouted, frantic.

Jade glanced at Katarina, who was stumbling more often now, then back to Dan, a fateful hesitation. A stiletto stamped on her foot above the steel toecap. Jade crumpled, then her head was yanked back unceremoniously by the hair.

The knee in her kidneys drove the breath from her, another had her cough and prioritise gasping in air. It was the stiletto heel gouged and twisted into the back of her knee though that caused Jade to kneel and with scalp burning from Raven’s grip, Jade knew they had failed.